India announces successful hypersonic missile test

Special India announces successful hypersonic missile test
India’s Defence Research and Development Organisation conducts a flight trial of its long-range hypersonic missile from Abdul Kalam Island, off the coast of Odisha on Nov. 16 2024. (DRDO/screengrab)
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Updated 17 November 2024
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India announces successful hypersonic missile test

India announces successful hypersonic missile test
  • Defense ministry says missile designed to carry payloads over distances greater than 1,500 km
  • Other countries known to have hypersonic missile capabilities are the US, China and Russia

NEW DELHI: India has test-fired its first long-range hypersonic missile, the Ministry of Defense announced on Sunday, marking the country’s entry into a small group of nations known to possess such weapons programs.

The Defence Research and Development Organisation — an agency under the Ministry of Defense — conducted the test on Saturday night on Abdul Kalam Island off the coast of the eastern state of Odisha.

The missile, designed to carry payloads over 1,500 km, was “indigenously developed by the laboratories of Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Missile complex, Hyderabad along with various other DRDO laboratories and industry partners,” the ministry said in a statement Sunday.

“The flight data obtained from down range ship stations confirmed the successful terminal maneuvers and impact with high degree of accuracy.”

Defense Minister Rajnath Singh took to social media to say the test was a “historic moment” that has put India country in the “group of select nations having capabilities of such critical and advanced military technologies.”

Hypersonic missiles can travel at speeds greater than five times the speed of sound, or 6,115 km per hour — much faster than other ballistic and cruise missiles, making them more difficult to track than traditional missile technology.

The other countries known to have such capabilities are the US, China, and Russia.

Defense expert Ranjit Kumar told Arab News that the successful launch of the hypersonic missile has enhanced the deterrent capabilities of the Indian missile arsenal.

“(The) hypersonic missile will add more teeth to the Indian missile firepower. (The) Indian Armed Forces already possess over 300 km range (supersonic) Brahmos cruise missile and over 5,000 km range Agni-V intercontinental ballistic missile, but the latest, over 1,500 km range hypersonic missile will ... give more confidence to the Indian military to be able to hit the target with sure success,” he said.

“At a time when India is surrounded with adversaries possessing long-range ballistic missiles, the latest hypersonic missile will deter them from launching a preemptive strike on Indian locations.”


Zohran Mamdani wins New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, defeating ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo

Zohran Mamdani wins New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, defeating ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo
Updated 48 min 33 sec ago
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Zohran Mamdani wins New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, defeating ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo

Zohran Mamdani wins New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, defeating ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo
  • Mamdani said he was humbled by the support he received in the primary and has started turning his attention to November
  • He will now face a general election field that includes incumbent Mayor Eric Adams as well as independent candidate Jim Walden and Republican Curtis Sliwa

NEW YORK: Zohran Mamdani has won New York City’s Democratic mayoral primary, a new vote count confirmed Tuesday, cementing his stunning upset of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and sending him to the general election.

The Associated Press called the race after the results of the city’s ranked choice voting tabulation were released and showed Mamdani trouncing Cuomo by 12 percentage points.

Mamdani said he was humbled by the support he received in the primary and has started turning his attention to November.

“Last Tuesday, Democrats spoke in a clear voice, delivering a mandate for an affordable city, a politics of the future, and a leader unafraid to fight back against rising authoritarianism,” he said in a statement.

Mamdani, a 33-year-old democratic socialist and member of the state Assembly since 2021, was virtually unknown when he launched his candidacy centered on a bold slate of populist ideas.

But he built an energetic campaign that ran circles around Cuomo as the older, more moderate Democrat tried to come back from the sexual harassment scandal that led to his resignation four years ago.

Mamdani’s win had been widely expected since he took a commanding lead and declared victory after the polls closed a week ago, but fell just short of the 50 percent of the vote needed to avoid another count under the ranked choice voting model. The system allows voters’ other preferences to be counted if their top candidate falls out of the running.

He will now face a general election field that includes incumbent Mayor Eric Adams as well as independent candidate Jim Walden and Republican Curtis Sliwa.

The former governor, down but not out

Cuomo conceded defeat on the night of the primary but is contemplating whether to run in the general election on an independent ballot line.

After the release of Tuesday’s vote count, Cuomo spokesperson Rich Azzopardi said: “We’ll be continuing conversations with people from all across the city while determining next steps.”

“Extremism, division and empty promises are not the answer to this city’s problems, and while this was a look at what motivates a slice of our primary electorate, it does not represent the majority,” Azzopardi said.

The results of the primary have already sent a shockwave through the political world.

Mamdani’s campaign — focused on lowering the cost of living, promising free city buses, free child care, a rent freeze for people living in rent-stabilized apartments, government-run grocery stores and more, all paid for with taxes on the wealthy — claims it has found a new blueprint for Democrats who have at times appeared rudderless during President Donald Trump’s climb back to power.

The Democratic establishment has approached Mamdani with caution. Many of its big players applauded his campaign but don’t seem ready to throw their full support behind the young progressive, whose past criticisms of law enforcement, use of the word “genocide” to describe the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza and “democratic socialist” label amount to land mines for some in the party.

Born in Uganda to Indian parents, Mamdani came to the US at age 7 and became a citizen in 2018. If elected, he would be the city’s first Muslim mayor and its first of Indian American decent. He would also be one of its youngest.

Cuomo’s campaign centered on his extensive experience, casting himself as the only candidate capable of saving a city he said had spun out of control. He focused heavily on combating antisemitism and leaned on his name recognition and juggernaut fundraising operation rather than mingling with voters.

He denied the sexual harassment allegations that ended his tenure as governor, maintaining that the scandal was driven by politics and that voters were ready to move on.

Trump and others are already on the attack

For Republicans, Mamdani has already provided a new angle for attack. Trump and others in the GOP have launched broadsides at him, moving to cast Mamdani as the epitome of leftist excess ahead of consequential elections elsewhere this year and next.

“If I’m a Republican, I want this guy to win,” said Grant Reeher, a political science professor at Syracuse University. “Because I want to be able to compare and contrast my campaign as a Republican, in a national election, to the idea of, ‘This is where the Democratic party is.’”

Trump, in remarks to reporters on Tuesday, appeared to have taken notice of Mamdani’s meteoric rise, saying “He’s still has a race to win, and so far he’s winning.”

Meanwhile, Adams, while still a Democrat, is running in the November election as an independent.

He dropped out of the Democratic primary in April after he was severely wounded by his now-dismissed federal bribery case.

Though he had done little in the way of campaigning since then, he reignited his reelection operation in the days after Mamdani declared victory, calling it a choice between a candidate with a “blue collar” and one with a “silver spoon.”

Echoing Cuomo’s message, Adams has sought to cast Mamdani as an unqualified radical whose agenda would sow chaos across the city.

“Right now, we should not be doing an experiment when we have real results and expertise to make New Yorkers safe,” Adams told reporters Tuesday.


Rubio hails end of USAID as Bush, Obama deplore cost in lives

Rubio hails end of USAID as Bush, Obama deplore cost in lives
Updated 01 July 2025
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Rubio hails end of USAID as Bush, Obama deplore cost in lives

Rubio hails end of USAID as Bush, Obama deplore cost in lives
  • “This program shows a fundamental question facing our country — is it in our nation’s interest that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is,” Bush said
  • Obama said that ending USAID was “inexplicable” and “will go down as a colossal mistake“

WASHINGTON: The US foreign aid agency formally closed down Tuesday, with President Donald Trump’s administration trumpeting the end of the “charity-based model” despite predictions that millions of lives will be lost.

Founded in 1961 as John F. Kennedy sought to leverage aid to win over the developing world in the Cold War, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has now been incorporated into the State Department — after Secretary of State Marco Rubio slashed 85 percent of its programming.

In a farewell to remaining staff on Monday, former presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama — as well as U2 frontman Bono — saluted their work and said it was still needed.

Bush pointed to PEPFAR, the massive US effort to fight HIV/AIDS that he considers one of the top achievements of his 2001-2009 Republican presidency.

“This program shows a fundamental question facing our country — is it in our nation’s interest that 25 million people who would have died now live? I think it is,” Bush said in a video message seen by AFP.

Obama, who like Bush has been sparing in openly criticizing Trump, said that ending USAID was “inexplicable” and “will go down as a colossal mistake.”

“Gutting USAID is a travesty and it is a tragedy because it’s some of the most important work happening anywhere in the world,” the Democrat said.

A study published in the medical journal The Lancet predicted that more than 14 million people would die, a third of them small children, by 2030 due to the foreign aid cuts.

Rubio painted a drastically different picture of USAID, which was an early target of a sweeping government cost-cutting drive led for Trump by billionaire Elon Musk.

Rubio said that USAID’s “charity-based model” fueled “addiction” by developing nations’ leaders and that trade was more effective.

“Beyond creating a globe-spanning NGO industrial complex at taxpayer expense, USAID has little to show since the end of the Cold War,” Rubio wrote in an essay.

He also complained that many recipients of US aid do not vote with the United States at the United Nations and that rival China often enjoys higher favorability among the public.

A senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that The Lancet study relied on “incorrect assumptions” and said the United States will continue aid but in a “more efficient” way.

He said that PEPFAR will remain, with a priority on stopping HIV transmission from mothers to children.
But he acknowledged the United States was no longer funding PrEP medication, which significantly reduces the rate of HIV transmission and has been encouraged by high-risk communities.

“No one is saying that gay men in Africa shouldn’t be on PrEP. That’s wonderful. It doesn’t mean that the United States has to pay for every single thing,” the official said.

He said the Trump administration was looking at “new and innovative solutions” and pointed to food deliveries in war-battered Gaza staffed by US military contractors and surrounded by Israeli troops.

Witnesses, the United Nations and local Gaza officials have reported that Israeli troops have repeatedly opened fire and killed Palestinians waiting for aid — although the US-backed initiative, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, denies any deadly incidents.

Bob Kitchen, the vice president for emergencies at the International Rescue Committee, said that the 14 million death prediction was consistent with what the humanitarian group was seeing.

Among the group’s programming that was funded through USAID, he said that nearly 400,000 refugees who fled the war in Sudan have now been deprived of acute aid and that more than 500,000 Afghans, mostly women and girls, have been cut off from education and health care.

European Union nations and Britain, rather than filling the gap, have also stepped back as they ramp up defense spending with encouragement from Trump.

Kitchen warned that cuts will not only worsen frontline emergencies but weaken more stable countries such as Ethiopia and Kenya, which will have no back-up if rains fail again.

Kitchen said that, beyond moral considerations, the cuts will aggravate migration, a top consideration for Trump.

“It’s self-interest. If insecurity spreads, outbreaks spread, there’s no line of defense anymore.”


EU says ready to facilitate return to Iran nuclear talks

EU says ready to facilitate return to Iran nuclear talks
Updated 01 July 2025
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EU says ready to facilitate return to Iran nuclear talks

EU says ready to facilitate return to Iran nuclear talks
  • Brussels is willing to facilitate a return to negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program after US and Israeli strikes
  • EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas held a phone call with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Tuesday

BRUSSELS: The EU’s top diplomat told Iran’s foreign minister Tuesday that Brussels is willing to facilitate a return to negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program after US and Israeli strikes.
“Negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program should restart as soon as possible” and “cooperation” with the International Atomic Energy Agency must resume, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas wrote on X after a phone call with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.
“The EU is ready to facilitate this.”
Kallas further warned Tehran that “any threats to pull out of the non-proliferation treaty don’t help to lower tensions.”
The call came after Aragchi ruled out a quick resumption of talks with the United States and said Tehran will first need assurances it will not be attacked again.
The United States and Iran were holding nuclear talks when Israel hit Iranian nuclear sites and military infrastructure. The United States joined the assault by bombing three nuclear sites — Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan — on June 21.
The EU has long sought to play a mediation role with Iran.
The 27-nation bloc was a signatory — and facilitator — of a 2015 deal between Iran and international powers over Tehran’s nuclear program.
US President Donald Trump abandoned that deal in 2018.


Putin, Macron hold first phone call since 2022, talked about Ukraine, Iran

Putin, Macron hold first phone call since 2022, talked about Ukraine, Iran
Updated 01 July 2025
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Putin, Macron hold first phone call since 2022, talked about Ukraine, Iran

Putin, Macron hold first phone call since 2022, talked about Ukraine, Iran

MOSCOW: Russian President Vladimir Putin and French counterpart Emmanuel Macron held their first known telephone conversation since 2022, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.
“Vladimir Putin held a telephone conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron,” the Kremlin said in a statement, making it their first such conversation since September 2022, several months after Russia launched its full-scale offensive on Ukraine.
Macron urged Putin on Tuesday in a two-hour call to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine “as soon as possible”.
Macron “emphasised France’s unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity” and “called for the establishment, as soon as possible, of a ceasefire and the launch of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia for a solid and lasting settlement of the conflict,” the Elysee Palace said.
On Iran, “the two presidents decided to coordinate their efforts and to speak soon in order to follow up together on this issue,” the French presidency added.


Italy boosts legal work visas, as union says policy falls short

Italy boosts legal work visas, as union says policy falls short
Updated 01 July 2025
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Italy boosts legal work visas, as union says policy falls short

Italy boosts legal work visas, as union says policy falls short
  • Meloni has sought to reduce the number of undocumented migrants to Italy
  • Her government has also increased pathways for legal migration for non-EU workers

ROME: Italy’s hard-right government has agreed to issue 500,000 visas for non-EU workers over the next three years, but a top trade union warned Tuesday that only structural change would tackle labor shortages.

The government of far-right Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said a total of 497,550 workers would be allowed in over the 2026-2028 period, starting with around 165,000 in 2026.

This is up from the 450,000 quota set by Meloni’s government for 2023-2025 period — itself a sharp increase on the 75,700 quota for 2022 and around 70,000 for 2021.

Meloni, the leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, has sought to reduce the number of undocumented migrants to Italy.

But her government has also increased pathways for legal migration for non-EU workers to tackle labor shortages in an aging country with a sluggish birth rate.

The greatest number of visas over the next three years — some 267,000 — will be given for seasonal work in the agricultural and tourism sectors.

Italy’s main agricultural lobby, Coldiretti, welcomed the new visa plan as an “important step forward to ensure the availability of workers in the fields, and with it, food production.”

But a top official in the CGIL trade union — Italy’s oldest and largest — said Tuesday the new quotas did not address migration dynamics and labor needs.

Maria Grazia Gabrielli pointed to the number of applications that were far lower than the available quotas, with the exception of domestic work.

In 2023 and 2024, only 7.5-7.8 percent of the quotas actually resulted in a residence permit, she said in a statement, pointing to their ineffectiveness.

Gabrielli criticized the government’s policy of prioritising applicants from countries who discourage their nationals from illegally migrating to Italy.

A 2023 decree allowed preferential quotas from countries, such as those in North Africa, who help Italy fight human traffickers and conduct media campaigns warning of the dangers of crossing the Mediterranean.

She called it a system “that takes no account whatsoever of the reasons for migration dynamics and the need for a response that does not focus on punitive logic and rewards for some countries.”

Italy’s foreign worker policy is fraught with loopholes and possibilities for fraud, with criminal gangs exploiting the system and even foreign workers already in Italy applying for visas.

The union leader said structural work was needed — including regularising workers already in Italy — to help employers struggling to find labor and to try to keep foreign workers out of irregular situations.