#Zelenskyy signs decree for Ukraine’s withdrawal from anti-landmine treaty. The Ottawa Convention bans signatories from acquiring, producing, stockpiling or using anti-personnel mines, which are designed to be buried or hidden on the ground.

They often leave victims mutilated if they are not immediately killed, and unexploded mines cause long-term risks for civilians.

Russia “is extremely cynical in its use of anti-personnel mines,” Zelenskyy said in his daily address.

“This is the trademark of Russian killers -– to destroy life by any means at their disposal,” he added.

More than 160 countries and territories are signatories to the Ottawa Convention, though neither the United States nor Russia have joined.

To enter into force, the decision still must be ratified by the Ukrainian parliament and notified to the United Nations.

The withdrawal would normally come into effect six months after the notification.

But according to the convention itself, if “on the expiry of that six-month period, the withdrawing state party is engaged in an armed conflict, the withdrawal shall not take effect before the end of the armed conflict.”

Zelenskyy said Ukraine -- more than three years into Moscow’s invasion -- was “aware of the complexities of the withdrawal procedure when it is carried out in wartime.”

“We are taking this political step and thus sending a signal to all our partners on what to focus on,” he added.

Confronted with the invasion, “Ukraine is compelled to give unconditional priority to the security of its citizens and the defence of the state,” Ukraine’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

It said the decision to withdraw was “difficult but necessary” in order to “protect our land from occupation, and our people from horrific Russian atrocities.”.

The move follows similar decisions by Kyiv’s allies Poland, Finland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia -- all neighbours of Russia.

In March, human rights groups condemned their intention to pull out from the convention.


View 199 times

After decades in the U.S., #Iranians arrested in Trump’s deportation drive.

Mandonna “Donna” Kashanian lived in the United States for 47 years, married a U.S. citizen and raised their daughter. She was gardening in the yard of her New Orleans home when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers handcuffed and took her away, her family said.

Kashanian arrived in 1978 on a student visa and applied for asylum, fearing retaliation for her father’s support of the U.S.-backed shah. She lost her bid, but she was allowied to remain with her husband and child if she checked in regularly with immigration officials, her husband and daughter said. She complied, once checking in from South Carolina during Hurricane Katrina. She is now being held at an immigration detention center in Basile, Louisiana, while her family tries to get information.

Other Iranians are also getting arrested by immigration authorities after decades in the United States. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security won’t say how many people they’ve arrested, but U.S. military strikes on Iran have fueled fears that there is more to come.

“Some level of vigilance, of course, makes sense, but what it seems like ICE has done is basically give out an order to round up as many Iranians as you can, whether or not they’re linked to any threat and then arrest them and deport them, which is very concerning,” said Ryan Costello, policy director of the National Iranian American Council, an advocacy group.

Homeland Security did not immediately reply to an email seeking comment on Kashanian’s case but have been touting arrests of Iranians. The department announced the arrests of at least 11 Iranians on immigration violations during the weekend of the U.S. missile strikes. U.S. Customs and Border Protection said, without elaborating, that it arrested seven Iranians at a Los Angeles-area address that “has been repeatedly used to harbor illegal entrants linked to terrorism.”

The department “has been full throttle on identifying and arresting known or suspected terrorists and violent extremists that illegally entered this country, came in through Biden’s fraudulent parole programs or otherwise,” spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said of the 11 arrests. She didn’t offer any evidence of terrorist or extremist ties. Her comment on parole programs referred to President Joe Biden’s expanded legal pathways to entry, which his successor, Donald Trump, shut down.

Russell Milne, Kashanian’s husband, said his wife is not a threat. Her appeal for asylum was complicated because of “events in her early life,” he explained. A court found an earlier marriage of hers to be fraudulent.

But over four decades, Kashanian, 64, built a life in Louisiana. The couple met when she was bartending as a student in the late 1980s. They married and had a daughter. She volunteered with Habitat for Humanity, filmed Persian cooking tutorials on YouTube and was a grandmother figure to the children next door.

The fear of deportation always hung over the family, Milne said, but he said his wife did everything that was being asked of her.

“She’s meeting her obligations,” Milne said. ”She’s retirement age. She’s not a threat. Who picks up a grandmother?”

While Iranians have been crossing the border illegally for years, especially since 2021, they have faced little risk of being deported to their home countries due to severed diplomatic relations with the U.S. That seems to no longer be the case.

The Trump administration has deported hundreds of people, including Iranians, to countries other than their own in an attempt to circumvent diplomatic hurdles with governments that won’t take their people back. During Trump’s second term, countries including El Salvador, Costa Rica and Panama have taken back noncitizens from the U.S.

The administration has asked the Supreme Court to clear the way for several deportations to South Sudan, a war-ravaged country with which it has no ties, after the justices allowed deportations to countries other than those noncitizens came from.

The U.S. Border Patrol arrested Iranians 1,700 times at the Mexican border from October 2021 through November 2024, according to the most recent public data available. The Homeland Security Department reported that about 600 Iranians overstayed visas as business or exchange visitors, tourists and students in the 12-month period through September 2023, the most recent data reports.

Iran was one of 12 countries subject to a U.S. travel ban that took effect this month. Some fear ICE’s growing deportation arrests will be another blow.

In Oregon, an Iranian man was detained by immigration agents this past week while driving to the gym. He was picked up roughly two weeks before he was scheduled for a check-in at ICE offices in Portland, according to court documents filed by his attorney, Michael Purcell.

The man, identified in court filings as S.F., has lived in the U.S. for over 20 years, and his wife and two children are U.S. citizens.

S.F. applied for asylum in the U.S. in the early 2000s, but his application was denied in 2002. His appeal failed but the government did not deport him and he continued to live in the country for decades, according to court documents.

Due to “changed conditions” in Iran, S.F. would face “a vastly increased danger of persecution” if he were to be deported, Purcell wrote in his petition. “These circumstances relate to the recent bombing by the United States of Iranian nuclear facilities, thus creating a de facto state of war between the United States and Iran.”

S.F.’s long residency in the U.S., his conversion to Christianity and the fact that his wife and children are U.S. citizens “sharply increase the possibility of his imprisonment in Iran, or torture or execution,” he said.

Similarly, Kashanian’s daughter said she is worried what will happen to her mother.

“She tried to do everything right,” Kaitlynn Milne said.

Kim Chandler, Claire Rush And Elliot Spagat, The Associated Press


View 201 times

#China’s humanoid robots generate more soccer excitement than their human counterparts.

Four teams of humanoid robots faced off in fully autonomous 3-on-3 soccer matches powered entirely by artificial intelligence on Saturday night in China’s capital in what was touted as a first in China and a preview for the upcoming World Humanoid Robot Games, set to take place in Beijing.

According to the organizers, a key aspect of the match was that all the participating robots operated fully autonomously using AI-driven strategies without any human intervention or supervision.

Equipped with advanced visual sensors, the robots were able to identify the ball and navigate the field with agility

They were also designed to stand up on their own after falling. However, during the match several still had to be carried off the field on stretchers by staff, adding to the realism of the experience.

China is stepping up efforts to develop AI-powered humanoid robots, using sports competitions like marathons, boxing, and football as a real-world proving ground.

Cheng Hao, founder and CEO of Booster Robotics, the company that supplied the robot players, said sports competitions offer the ideal testing ground for humanoid robots, helping to accelerate the development of both algorithms and integrated hardware-software systems.

He also emphasized safety as a core concern in the application of humanoid robots.

“In the future, we may arrange for robots to play football with humans. That means we must ensure the robots are completely safe,” Cheng said. “For example, a robot and a human could play a match where winning doesn’t matter, but real offensive and defensive interactions take place. That would help audiences build trust and understand that robots are safe.”

Booster Robotics provided the hardware for all four university teams, while each school’s research team developed and embedded their own algorithms for perception, decision-making, player formations, and passing strategies—including variables such as speed, force, and direction, according to Cheng.

In the final match, Tsinghua University’s THU Robotics defeated the China Agricultural University’s Mountain Sea team with a score of 5–3 to win the championship.

Mr. Wu, a supporter of Tsinghua, celebrated their victory while also praising the competition.

“They (THU) did really well,” he said. “But the Mountain Sea team (of Agricultural University) was also impressive. They brought a lot of surprises.”

China’s men have made only one World Cup appearance and have already been knocked out of next years’ competition in Canada, Mexico and the United States.


View 199 times

Serbian riot police fire tear gas at anti-government protesters demanding an early election.

The protest by tens of thousands of demonstrators was held after nearly eight months of persistent dissent led by Serbia’s university students that have rattled Vucic’s firm grip on power in the Balkan country.

The huge crowd chanted: “We want elections!” as they filled the capital’s central Slavija Square and several blocks around it, with many unable to reach the venue.
Dozens of detained protesters handcuffed

Police handcuffed detained protesters, and an officer was seen injured on the ground during street battles in central Belgrade that lasted several hours. Six police officers and an unknown number of citizens were injured, police said.

“Serbia always wins in the end,” President Vucic said in an Instagram post.

Vucic, a former extreme nationalist, has become increasingly authoritarian since coming to power more than a decade ago. Though he formally says he wants Serbia to join the European Union, critics say Vucic has stifled democratic freedoms as he strengthened ties with Russia and China.

As the protest formally ended, the demonstrators threw eggs, plastic bottles and other objects at riot police who were preventing the crowd from approaching a downtown park. At the park, hundreds of Vucic’s loyalists have been camping for months to form a human shield in front of his headquarters in the capital.

Serbia’s Interior Minister Ivica Dacic said participants in the protest attacked the police. He said police used their powers to restore public order and “arrest all those who attacked the police.”

Police later said dozens of “hooligans” were detained but did not provide the exact number.

Some demonstrators wore scarfs and masks over their faces as they clashed with law enforcement, using garbage cans as protection against baton wielding police. Police used pepper spray before pushing protesters with their shields.

Tensions were high before and during the gathering as riot police deployed around government buildings.

“Elections are a clear way out of the social crisis caused by the deeds of the government, which is undoubtedly against the interests of their own people,” said a student who didn’t give her name while addressing the crowd from a stage. “Today, on June 28, 2025, we declare the current authorities illegitimate.”
University students playing a key role

At the end of the official part of the rally, students told the crowd to “take freedom into your own hands.”

University students have been a key force behind nationwide anti-corruption demonstrations that started after a renovated rail station canopy collapsed, killing 16 people on Nov. 1.

Many blamed the concrete roof crash on rampant government corruption and negligence in state infrastructure projects, leading to recurring mass protests.

“We are here today because we cannot take it any more,” student Darko Kovacevic said. “This has been going on for too long. We are mired in corruption.”

Vucic and his right-wing Serbian Progressive Party have repeatedly refused the demand for an early vote and accused protesters of planning to spur violence on orders from abroad, which they didn’t specify or provide evidence of.

Vucic’s authorities have launched a crackdown on Serbia’s striking universities and other opponents, while increasing pressure on independent media as they tried to curb the demonstrations.

While numbers have shrunk in recent weeks, the massive showing for Saturday’s anti-Vucic rally suggested that the resolve persists, despite relentless pressure and after nearly eight months of almost daily protests.

Serbian police, who are firmly controlled by Vucic’s government, said 36,000 people were present at the start of the protest Saturday. An independent monitoring group that records public gatherings said around 140,000 people attended the student-led rally.

Saturday marks St. Vitus Day, a religious holiday and the date when Serbs mark a 14th-century battle against Ottoman Turks in Kosovo that was the start of hundreds of years of Turkish rule, holding symbolic importance.

In their speeches, some of the speakers at the student rally Saturday evoked the theme, which was also used to fuel Serbian nationalism in the 1990s that later led to the incitement of ethnic wars following the breakup of the former Yugoslavia.
Vucic supporters bused in to Belgrade

Hours before the student-led rally, Vucic’s party bused in scores of its own supporters to Belgrade from other parts of the country, many wearing T-shirts reading: “We won’t give up Serbia.” They were joining a camp of Vucic’s loyalists in central Belgrade where they have been staying in tents since mid-March.

In a show of business as usual, Vucic handed out presidential awards in the capital to people he deemed worthy, including artists and journalists. “People need not worry -- the state will be defended and thugs brought to justice,” he told reporters Saturday.

Serbian presidential and parliamentary elections are due in 2027.

Earlier this week, police arrested several people accused of allegedly plotting to overthrow the government and banned entry into the country, without explanation, to several people from Croatia and a theater director from Montenegro.

Serbia’s railway company halted train service over an alleged bomb threat in what critics said was an apparent bid to prevent people from traveling to Belgrade for the rally.

Authorities made similar moves in March, before the biggest ever anti-government protest in the Balkan country, which drew hundreds of thousands of people.

By Jovana Gec.

Dusan Stojanovic contributed to this report.


View 201 times

Russian drones struck the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa overnight, killing two people and injuring at least 17, Ukrainian authorities said on Saturday. Meanwhile, three attack helicopters and an anti-aircraft missile system were destroyed in the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula.

Ukraine’s Security Service agency deployed special drones to attack the Kirovske military airfield, a Ukrainian security official said on Saturday.

“Available data indicate the destruction of multi-purpose and attack helicopters Mi-8, Mi-26 and Mi-28, as well as the self-propelled anti-aircraft missile and gun complex Pantsir-S1,” according to the official, who spoke about the operation on condition of anonymity.

In Odesa, a drone slammed into a residential tower block in the city, causing damage to three floors and trapping residents, emergency services said. The two killed in the attack were a married couple, according to regional Gov. Oleh Kiper, who added that three children were among the injured.

There was no immediate comment from Moscow. According to Russia’s Defense Ministry, over 40 Ukrainian drones were shot down overnight and on Saturday morning over western Russia and Kremlin-occupied Crimea.

Long-range drone strikes have been a hallmark of the war, now in its fourth year. The race by both sides to develop increasingly sophisticated and deadlier drones has turned the war into a testing ground for new weaponry.

Ukrainian drones have pulled off some stunning feats. At the start of June, nearly a third of Moscow’s strategic bomber fleet was destroyed or damaged in a covert Ukrainian operation using cheaply made drones sneaked into Russian territory.

Smaller, short-range drones are used by both sides on the battlefield and in areas close to the roughly 1,000-kilometre (620-mile) front line.

The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine said in a report published Thursday that short-range drone attacks killed at least 395 civilians and injured 2,635 between the start of the war in February 2022 and April 2025. Almost 90 per cent of the attacks were by the Russian armed forces, it reported.

More than 13,300 civilians have died and over 34,700 have been injured in the war, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said a June 11 report.

The Associated Press


View 196 times

At least 34 people killed in Israeli strikes in Gaza as ceasefire prospects inch closer.

Israeli strikes killed at least 72 people across Gaza overnight and into Saturday, health workers said, as ceasefire prospects were said to be improving after 21 months of war.

Three children and their parents were killed in an Israeli strike on a tent camp in Muwasi near the southern city of Khan Younis. They were struck while sleeping, relatives said.

“What did these children do to them? What is their fault?” said the children’s grandmother, Suad Abu Teima, as others knelt to kiss their bloodied faces and wept. Some placed red flowers into the body bags.

Also among the dead were 12 people near the Palestine Stadium in Gaza City, which was sheltering displaced people, and eight more in apartments, according to staff at Shifa Hospital. More than 20 bodies were taken to Nasser Hospital, according to health officials.

A midday strike killed 11 people on a street in eastern Gaza City, and their bodies were taken to Al-Ahli Hospital. Another strike on a gathering in eastern Gaza City killed eight including five children, the hospital said. A strike on a gathering at the entrance to the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza killed two, according to Al-Awda Hospital.
Hopes for a ceasefire agreement in the coming week

U.S. President Donald Trump says there could be a ceasefire agreement within the next week. Taking questions from reporters on Friday, he said, “We’re working on Gaza and trying to get it taken care of.”

An official with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press that Israeli Minister for Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer will arrive in Washington next week for talks on a Gaza ceasefire, Iran and other subjects. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Indirect talks between Israel and Hamas have been on again, off again since Israel broke the latest ceasefire in March, continuing its military campaign in Gaza and furthering the territory’s dire humanitarian crisis. Some 50 hostages remain in Gaza, fewer than half believed to still be alive. They were among 251 hostages taken when Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, sparking the war.

“What more is left to do in Gaza that has not already been done? Who else is left to eliminate?” Yotam Cohen, brother of hostage Nimrod Cohen, said Saturday evening as weekly rallies by families and supporters resumed following Israel’s ceasefire with Iran.
Over 6,000 killed since latest ceasefire ended

The war has killed over 56,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. It says more than half of the dead were women and children. It said the dead include 6,089 killed since the end of the latest ceasefire.

Israel says it only targets militants and blames civilian deaths on Hamas, accusing the militants of hiding among civilians because they operate in populated areas.

There is hope among families of hostages that Trump’s involvement in securing the recent ceasefire between Israel and Iran might lead to more pressure for a deal in Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is riding a wave of public support for the Iran war and its achievements, and he could feel he has more space to move toward ending the war in Gaza, something his far-right governing partners oppose.

Hamas has repeatedly said it is prepared to free all the hostages in exchange for an end to the war in Gaza. Netanyahu says he will end the war only once Hamas is disarmed and exiled, something the group has rejected.
Hundreds have been killed while seeking food

Meanwhile, hungry Palestinians are enduring a catastrophic situation in Gaza. After blocking all food for 2 1/2 months, Israel has allowed only a trickle of supplies into the territory since mid-May.

More than 500 Palestinians have been killed and hundreds more wounded while seeking food since the newly formed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began distributing aid in the territory about a month ago, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Palestinian witnesses say Israeli troops have opened fire at crowds on roads heading toward the sites. The Israeli military says it has only fired warning shots and that it was investigating incidents in which civilians had been harmed while approaching the sites.

Thousands of Palestinians walk for hours to reach the sites, moving through Israeli military zones.

Separate efforts by the United Nations to distribute limited food have been plagued by armed gangs looting trucks and by crowds of desperate people offloading supplies from convoys.

Saturday’s death toll included two people killed by Israeli gunfire while waiting to receive aid near the Netzarim corridor, a road that separates northern and southern Gaza, according to Al-Shifa and Al-Awda hospitals, which each received one body.

There was no immediate Israeli military comment.

___

Mednick reported from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press journalist Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut contributed to this report.

By Wafaa Shurafa and Sam Mednick.


View 195 times

Trump tells Iran’s supreme leader: ‘You got beat to hell’, Trump, in remarks to reporters and later in an extended statement on social media, said the ayatollah’s comments defied reality after 12 days of Israeli strikes and the U.S. bombardment of three key nuclear sites inflicted severe damage on the country’s nuclear program. The president suggested Khamenei’s comments were unbecoming of Iran’s most powerful political and religious figure.

“Look, you’re a man of great faith. A man who’s highly respected in his country. You have to tell the truth,” Trump said of Khamenei. ”You got beat to hell.”

The U.S. president spoke out a day after Khamenei insisted Tehran had delivered a “slap to America’s face” by striking a U.S. air base in Qatar and warned against further attacks by the U.S. or Israel on Iran. Khamenei’s pre-recorded statement, which aired on Iranian state television, was the first time that Iranians had heard directly from the supreme leader in days.

The heated rhetoric from Trump and Khamenei continued as both leaders face difficult questions about the impact of the strikes.

Trump and his aides have pushed back vociferously after an early damage assessment from the Defense Intelligence Agency became public and indicated that the U.S. bombardment likely only set back Tehran’s nuclear program by months. The 86-year-old Khamenei, the most powerful figure in Iran’s theocracy, meanwhile, has appeared intent on demonstrating his authority and vigor amid speculation about his health and how involved he was in making Iran’s wartime decisions through the 12-day conflict.

In a social media post Friday, Trump also appeared to refer to a plan presented to the White House by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in the first days of the Israel-Iran conflict to try to kill Khamenei. Trump vetoed that plan, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

“His Country was decimated, his three evil Nuclear Sites were OBLITERATED, and I knew EXACTLY where he was sheltered, and would not let Israel, or the U.S. Armed Forces, by far the Greatest and Most Powerful in the World, terminate his life,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “I SAVED HIM FROM A VERY UGLY AND IGNOMINIOUS DEATH, and he does not have to say, “THANK YOU, PRESIDENT TRUMP!”

Trump, after the U.S. airstrikes, sent chilling warnings via social media to Khamenei that the U.S. knew where he was but had no plans to kill him, “at least for now.”

After launching the U.S. strikes — including with U.S.-made bunker-buster bombs — Trump has been insistent that Iran’s nuclear sites have been “obliterated.” Administration officials have not disputed the contents of the DIA report but have sought to focus on a CIA statement and other intelligence assessments, including those out of Iran and Israel, that said the strikes severely damaged the nuclear sites and rendered an enrichment facility inoperable.

Trump also said that he expects Iran to open itself to international inspection to verify it doesn’t restart its nuclear program.

Asked if he would demand during expected talks with Iran that the International Atomic Energy Agency or some other organization be authorized to conduct inspections, Trump told reporters the Islamic Republic would have to cooperate with the IAEA “or somebody that we respect, including ourselves.”

White House officials have said they expect to restart talks soon with Iran, though nothing has been scheduled.

U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff earlier this week said there has been direct and indirect communication between the countries. A sixth round of U.S.-Iran negotiations was scheduled for earlier this month in Oman but was canceled after Israel attacked Iran.

Trump expressed confidence that Iran’s nuclear ambition has faded.

“Can I tell you, they’re exhausted. And Israel’s exhausted, too,” Trump said. He added, “The last thing they’re thinking right now is nuclear.”


View 190 times

Here’s what we know about the Canadian who died in ICE custody, Johnny Noviello’s former lawyer describes the 49-year-old, who died while in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on Monday, as quiet, polite and respectful.

“Just always appreciative, respectful, excellent with communication, not the type of guy you would see wrapped up in the mess as Johnny did,” said Dan Leising, a defence lawyer who represented Noviello. “Johnny was a very quiet, polite, unassuming guy.”

Leising said his only known family member is his father, Angelo, who was “distraught” to hear about his son’s death.

“Just complete disbelief. Devastation, just complete devastation,” added Leising. “Angelo is 80 years old. To be 80 and to have your kid die when he’s 49, it’s unimaginable.”

According to ICE, Noviello was “found unresponsive” on June 23 just before 1 p.m. at a federal detention centre in Miami. The government agency said medical staff tried to resuscitate him and used a defibrillator -- but was pronounced dead by the Miami Fire Rescue Department.

“This is the first time I’ve ever had a client die in any sort of custody,” said Leising.

Noviello became a permanent resident in 1991, but, according to ICE, in October of 2023, he was convicted of racketeering and drug trafficking and sentenced to 12 months in prison.

“He did around four months of jail from October of 2023 to February of 2024,” said Leising, adding that Noviello did another year after that of “community control,” which is a form of intensive supervision of offenders within the community.

Leising said Noviello worked as a cashier at a store and worked in janitorial services.

According to ICE, agents arrested Noviello on May 15 because of his previous conviction, which violated the conditions of his permanent residency.

The press release says Noviello was detained pending removal proceedings, which means a person has been notified they are subject to a process that could lead to their deportation from the country.

“We were also in touch with him from a consular standpoint as soon as he was detained,” said Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand during a Zoom interview with CTV News, adding that Canada has also reached out to seek additional information.

ICE says the cause of death is still under investigation and that they notified the Consulate of Canada of Noviello’s death.

Anand says there are approximately 55 Canadians who are still detained by #ICE. According to ICE data, seven other people have died in 2025 while in ICE’s custody.


View 184 times

Global cocaine boom keeps setting new records, #UN report says. The global cocaine trade keeps setting new records, with cocaine the world’s fastest-growing illicit drug market as Colombia production surges along with users in Europe and North and South America, a United Nations report published on Thursday said.

The annual UN Office on Drugs and Crime’s (UNODC) World Drug Report showed that in 2023, the latest year for which comprehensive data was available, the cocaine trade went from strength to strength.

“Production, seizures, and use of cocaine all hit new highs in 2023, making cocaine the world’s fastest-growing illicit drug market,” the Vienna-based UNODC said in a statement.

On the supply side, global estimated illegal production of cocaine rose by around a third to a record of more than 3,708 tons, mainly because of an increase in the area devoted to illicit coca bush cultivation in Colombia and updated data that showed the yield there was roughly 50% higher than in 2022.

The estimated number of cocaine users globally also kept growing, reaching 25 million people in 2023, up from 17 million 10 years earlier, the UNODC said.

“North America, Western and Central Europe and South America continue to constitute the largest markets for cocaine, on the basis of the number of people who used drugs in the past year and on data derived from wastewater analysis,” it said.

The synthetic drug market also continues to expand, helped by low operational costs and reduced risk of detection for those making or smuggling the drugs, the UNODC said.

The leading drugs there were amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) like methamphetamine and amphetamine.

“Seizures of ATS reached a record high in 2023 and accounted for almost half of all global seizures of synthetic drugs, followed by synthetic opioids, including fentanyl,” the UNODC said.


View 183 times

In an interview with The Associated Press, Israel’s ambassador to France said the killings will make it “almost” impossible for Iran to build weapons from whatever nuclear infrastructure and material may have survived nearly two weeks of Israeli airstrikes and massive bunker-busting bombs dropped by U.S. stealth bombers.

“The fact that the whole group disappeared is basically throwing back the program by a number of years, by quite a number of years,” Ambassador Joshua Zarka said.

But nuclear analysts say Iran has other scientists who can take their place. European governments say that military force alone cannot eradicate Iran’s nuclear know-how, which is why they want a negotiated solution to put concerns about the Iranian program to rest.

“Strikes cannot destroy the knowledge Iran has acquired over several decades, nor any regime ambition to deploy that knowledge to build a nuclear weapon,” U.K. Foreign Secretary David Lammy told lawmakers in the House of Commons.

Iran has long maintained that its nuclear program was peaceful, and U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that Tehran is not actively pursuing a bomb. However, Israeli leaders have argued that Iran could quickly assemble a nuclear weapon.

Here’s a closer look at the killings:
Chemists, physicists, engineers among those killed

Zarka told AP that Israeli strikes killed at least 14 physicists and nuclear engineers, top Iranian scientific leaders who “basically had everything in their mind.”

They were killed “not because of the fact that they knew physics, but because of the fight that they were personally involved in, the creation and the fabrication and the production of (a) nuclear weapon,” he said.

Nine of them were killed in Israel’s opening wave of attacks on June 13, the Israeli military said. It said they “possessed decades of accumulated experience in the development of nuclear weapons” and included specialists in chemistry, materials and explosives as well as physicists.

Zarka spoke Monday to the AP. On Tuesday, Iran state TV reported the death of another Iranian nuclear scientist, Mohammad Reza Sedighi Saber, in an Israeli strike, after he’d survived an earlier attack that killed his 17-year-old son on June 13.
Targeted killings meant to discourage would-be successors

Experts say that decades of Iranian work on nuclear energy — and, Western powers allege, nuclear weapons — has given the country reserves of know-how and scientists who could continue any work toward building warheads to fit on Iran’s ballistic missiles.

“Blueprints will be around and, you know, the next generation of Ph.D. students will be able to figure it out,” said Mark Fitzpatrick, who specialized in nuclear non-proliferation as a former U.S. diplomat. Bombing nuclear facilities ”or killing the people will set it back some period of time. Doing both will set it back further, but it will be reconstituted.”

“They have substitutes in maybe the next league down, and they’re not as highly qualified, but they will get the job done eventually,” said Fitzpatrick, now an analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London think tank.

How quickly nuclear work could resume will in part depend on whether Israeli and U.S. strikes destroyed Iran’s stock of enriched uranium and equipment needed to make it sufficiently potent for possible weapons use.

“The key element is the material. So once you have the material, then the rest is reasonably well-known,” said Pavel Podvig, a Geneva-based analyst who specializes in Russia’s nuclear arsenal. He said killing scientists may have been intended “to scare people so they don’t go work on these programs.”

“Then the questions are, ‘Where do you stop?’ I mean you start killing, like, students who study physics?” he asked. “This is a very slippery slope.”

The Israeli ambassador said: “I do think that people that will be asked to be part of a future nuclear weapon program in Iran will think twice about it.”

Israel is widely believed to be the only Middle Eastern country with nuclear weapons, which it has never acknowledged.
Previous attacks on scientists

Israel has long been suspected of killing Iranian nuclear scientists but previously didn’t claim responsibility as it did this time.

In 2020, Iran blamed Israel for killing its top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, with a remote-controlled machine gun.

“It delayed the program but they still have a program. So it doesn’t work,” said Paris-based analyst Lova Rinel, with the Foundation for Strategic Research think tank. “It’s more symbolic than strategic.”

Without saying that Israel killed Fakhrizadeh, the Israeli ambassador said “Iran would have had a bomb a long time ago” were it not for repeated setbacks to its nuclear program — some of which Iran attributed to Israeli sabotage.

“They have not reached the bomb yet,” Zarka said. “Every one of these accidents has postponed a little bit the program.”
A legally grey area

International humanitarian law bans the intentional killing of civilians and non-combatants. But legal scholars say those restrictions might not apply to nuclear scientists if they were part of the Iranian armed forces or directly participating in hostilities.

“My own take: These scientists were working for a rogue regime that has consistently called for the elimination of Israel, helping it to develop weapons that will allow that threat to take place. As such, they are legitimate targets,” said Steven R. David, a professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University.

He said Nazi German and Japanese leaders who fought Allied nations during World War II “would not have hesitated to kill the scientists working on the Manhattan Project” that fathered the world’s first atomic weapons.

Laurie Blank, a specialist in humanitarian law at Emory Law School, said it’s too early to say whether Israel’s decapitation campaign was legal.

“As external observers, we don’t have all the relevant facts about the nature of the scientists’ role and activities or the intelligence that Israel has,” she said by email to AP. “As a result, it is not possible to make any definitive conclusions.”

Zarka, the ambassador, distinguished between civilian nuclear research and the scientists targeted by Israel.

“It’s one thing to learn physics and to know exactly how a nucleus of an atom works and what is uranium,” he said.

But turning uranium into warheads that fit onto missiles is “not that simple,” he said. ”These people had the know-how of doing it, and were developing the know-how of doing it further. And this is why they were eliminated.”


View 169 times