Austria says stabbing attack suspect swore allegiance to Daesh
Austria says stabbing attack suspect swore allegiance to Daesh/node/2590472/world
Austria says stabbing attack suspect swore allegiance to Daesh
Austria's Interior Minister Gerhard Karner (L) places a candle on February 16, 2025 at the site where a man randomly attacked passers-by with a knife and stabbed to death a teenager and wounded five other people in Villach, Austria. (AFP)
Austria says stabbing attack suspect swore allegiance to Daesh
Daesh calling for lone wolf attacks in America and Europe following a New Year attack in New Orleans, according to SITE Intelligence.
Daesh has not claimed responsibility for the attack so far
Updated 16 February 2025
Reuters
VILLACH: The Syrian asylum-seeker suspected of carrying out a deadly stabbing rampage in the Austrian town of Villach had sworn allegiance to Daesh and was radicalized online, authorities said on Sunday.
A 14-year-old boy was killed in Saturday afternoon’s attack in the center of Villach and five other people were wounded, three of whom are in intensive care, police said.
Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told a press conference in Villach that the 23-year-old Syrian man, who was arrested seven minutes after the first call to the police, had been rapidly radicalized on the internet and that the Daesh flag had been found in his apartment.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Police said the man, who is being charged with murder and attempted murder, had recorded himself swearing an oath of allegiance to Daesh.
• More harm would have been done had it not been for another Syrian, a food delivery driver, who saw the attacker and drove into him with his vehicle to stop him, authorities said.
Karner, a conservative, told reporters there was sadness and sympathy for the victims, then added: “But in these moments there’s also understandably often anger and rage. Anger at an attacker who randomly stabbed innocent people here in this town.”
Police said the man, who is being charged with murder and attempted murder, had recorded himself swearing an oath of allegiance to Daesh.
More harm would have been done had it not been for another Syrian, a food delivery driver, who saw the attacker and drove into him with his vehicle to stop him, authorities said.
Daesh has not claimed responsibility for the attack so far. However, the media section of Daesh’s Afghan branch, Daesh-K, recently circulated a post by Daesh calling for lone wolf attacks in America and Europe following a New Year attack in New Orleans, according to SITE Intelligence.
The bloodshed in Villach followed the thwarting of a plot in August to carry out a suicide attack at a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna by a teenager who had also sworn loyalty to Daesh.
Russia, Ukraine continue air attacks with ceasefire prospects uncertain
Both sides have since traded heavy aerial strikes, and Russia moved closer on battlefield to ejecting Ukrainian forces from their months-old foothold
Updated 57 min ago
Reuters
Russia and Ukraine continued aerial attacks on each other, inflicting injuries and damages, officials said early on Sunday, as the fate of a proposed ceasefire to the three-year-old war remained uncertain.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday he supported in principle Washington’s proposal for a 30-day ceasefire with Ukraine but that his forces would fight on until several crucial conditions were worked out.
Both sides have since traded heavy aerial strikes, and Russia moved closer on battlefield to ejecting Ukrainian forces from their months-old foothold in the western Russian region of Kursk.
The Russian defense ministry said on Sunday that its air defense units destroyed a total of 31 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory.
Of those, 16 were downed over the southwestern region of Voronezh, nine over the territory of the Belgorod region and the rest over the Rostov and Kursk regions, the ministry said on the Telegram messaging app.
In a Ukrainian drone attack on the Russian border region of Belgorod, three people were injured, including a 7-year-old, regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said earlier on the Telegram messaging app.
Two of the people were injured after a drone hit their house, sparking a fire in the Gubkinsky district of the region, while the other person was injured in a drone attack on the village of Dolgoye, Gladkov said.
Alexander Gusev, governor of Voronezh, said on Telegram that there was no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
The acting governor of the southern Russian region of Rostov said there were no immediate reports of injuries or damage reported there either.
In Ukraine, authorities reported several Russian drone strikes, including on the northern region of Chernihiv, where firefighters were battling a blaze at a high-rise building that was sparked by Russian drone attack, Ukraine’s state of emergency service said.
Ukrainian media reported a series of explosions in the region surrounding the capital Kyiv, after Ukraine’s air force issued warnings of a threat of drone attacks on Kyiv and a number of other central Ukrainian regions.
By 0300 GMT on Sunday, there was no official information about damage in the Kyiv region.
Myanmar village air strike kills at least 12, says local official
Myanmar's military seized power in a 2021 coup which has plunged the country into a fractious civil war
Updated 16 March 2025
AFP
Letpanhla: A Myanmar junta airstrike on a village held by anti-coup fighters killed at least 12 people according to a local administrative official, who said the bombardment targeted civilian areas.
Myanmar's military seized power in a 2021 coup which has plunged the country into a fractious civil war and analysts say the embattled junta is increasingly using air strikes to target civilians.
The Friday afternoon strike hit the village of Letpanhla around 60 kilometres (40 miles) north of the country's second biggest city of Mandalay.
The village in Singu township is held by the People's Defence Forces (PDF) -- anti-coup guerillas who took up arms after the military toppled the country's civilian government four years ago.
"A lot of people were killed because they dropped bombs on crowded areas," said the local administrative official, who asked to remain anonymous. "It happened at the time people were going to the market".
"We're currently making a list and have registered 12 people killed," he said on Saturday.
A junta spokesman could not be reached for comment and AFP could not independently verify the death toll. The local PDF unit reported there had been 27 fatalities.
Wails of grief
Witness Myint Soe, 62, said he tried to hide as an aircraft came in for a bombing run.
"I heard huge bomb blast sounds at the same time I was hiding," he said. "When I came out and looked at the market area I saw it was on fire."
In the aftermath, buildings which appeared to be homes and a restaurant were ablaze, as people in civilian clothing and camouflage uniforms doused the flames with water.
The limp body of a child with a bloody head wound was loaded into the back of an ambulance by a man whose uniform was marked with the PDF insignia.
Wails of grief could be heard as some of the crowd glanced up towards the sky.
Myanmar is now controlled by a patchwork of junta forces, ethnic armed groups and anti-coup partisans.
The number of military air strikes on civilians has risen year on year during the civil war, according to non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED), with nearly 800 in 2024.
That figure was more than triple the previous year and ACLED predicted the junta will continue to rely on air strikes because it is "under increasing military pressure on the ground".
"The military will persevere in its indiscriminate aerial attacks on civilian populated areas in an effort to undermine the opposition's support base and destroy their morale," it said in December.
An offensive by an alliance of armed ethnic groups in late 2023 inflicted stinging territorial losses on the junta.
But analysts say the Myanmar air force, which operates with Russian technical support, has been key to fending off its adversaries based mainly in the borderlands.
More than 3.5 million citizens are currently displaced and half the population lives in poverty.
Top US, Russian diplomats discuss next steps on Ukraine
Despite recent tensions between President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, Kyiv has agreed in principle to a US-brokered 30-day unconditional ceasefire if Moscow halts its attacks in eastern Ukraine
Updated 16 March 2025
AFP
WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke on Saturday to discuss the next stage in talks on ending Moscow’s war against Ukraine.
According to State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce, the top diplomats “agreed to continue working toward restoring communication between the United States and Russia.”
The statement gave no details on when the next round of US-Russia talks, which are being hosted by Saudi Arabia, would begin.
Rubio also updated Lavrov on military activity in the Middle East, where US forces carried out deadly strikes Saturday against Houthi rebel targets in Yemen, the statement said.
Despite recent tensions between President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, Kyiv has agreed in principle to a US-brokered 30-day unconditional ceasefire if Moscow halts its attacks in eastern Ukraine.
Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has not however agreed to any truce, instead setting conditions that were beyond what was called for in the US agreement with Ukraine.
On the Mongolian steppe, climate change pushes herders to the brink
The vast country is one of the most affected by climate change, by some counts warming three times faster than the global average
Across Mongolia, more than seven million animals were killed after a devastating winter wiped
Updated 16 March 2025
AFP
KHARKHORIN, Mongolia: Over a year after a devastating winter wiped out virtually his entire sheep flock, herder Zandan Lkhamsuren is still reckoning with the damage wrought by Mongolia’s increasingly erratic extreme weather.
The vast country is one of the most affected by climate change, by some counts warming three times faster than the global average.
The link between rising temperatures and extreme weather — ranging from droughts and floods to heatwaves and cold snaps — is well-established.
In Mongolia the effects are stark.
Among other consequences, deep freezes like the one that killed Zandan’s herd — known as dzuds — have been growing more frequent and intense.
“Last year’s winter was the hardest I’ve ever known,” the 48-year-old told AFP, describing daytime temperatures of minus 32 degrees Celsius (minus 25.6 degrees Fahrenheit) that plunged to minus 42C at night.
This aerial photo taken on February 20, 2025 shows horses trying to graze on a hill covered with snow in Argalant, in central Mongolia's Tov province. (AFP)
Heavy snowfall and frozen ground meant his sheep could not find food, and all except two of his 280-strong flock perished.
Across Mongolia, more than seven million animals were killed, over a tenth of the country’s total.
“Our livestock used to cover all of our expenses, and we used to live very nicely,” Zandan told AFP as he served hot salted milk tea in his traditional ger home.
But the loss of his animals and the loans he took out to keep feeding a smaller, hardier herd of goats mean he now struggles to make ends meet.
Both his daughters were supposed to start university in the capital Ulaanbaatar last year, but the family could not afford their tuition fees.
“Now my strategy is just to focus on what I have left,” Zandan said.
Next to the ger’s coal burner, a persistent bleating came from a box containing a sickly week-old goat.
As the setting sun cast long shadows over the steppe, Zandan pulled on a thick green brocade jacket and strode outside, whistling as he shepherded his indignant charges into a shelter for the night.
He said he was keeping a positive mindset — if he could boost his goat numbers, he might be able to fund his daughters’ studies further down the line.
“It’s just one downside of herders’ lives,” he said stoically. “But I’m sure we can recover.”
The problem for Zandan — and other agricultural workers that make up a third of Mongolia’s population — is that dzuds are happening more often.
They used to occur about once every 10 years, but there have been six in the last decade or so, according to the United Nations.
And while overgrazing has long contributed to desertification on the steppe, climate change is making things even worse.
Droughts in the summers have made it harder to fatten animals and stockpile fodder for winter.
“Like many other herder men, I always look at the sky and try to predict the weather,” Zandan told AFP.
“But it’s been getting difficult,” he said. “Climate change is happening.”
His motorbike kicking up clouds of dust, 36-year-old Enebold Davaa shared those concerns as he chased his herd across the plain.
Mongolian herder Enebold Davaa on a motorcycle herding his goats in Kharkhorin, in central Mongolia's Ovorkhangai province. (AFP)
Enebold’s family lost more than 100 goats, 40 sheep and three cows last winter.
“It’s our main source of income, so we felt very heavy, it was very hard for us,” he said.
This year’s milder winter had allowed the family to recover some of their losses, but Enebold said he viewed the future with trepidation.
“Of course we are anxious, but there’s nothing we can predict now,” he said.
Local official Gankhuyag Banzragch told AFP most families in the district lost 30 to 40 percent of their livestock last winter.
As herding became more difficult, many families were moving away, he added.
A quarter of Mongolians still lead nomadic lives, but in recent decades hundreds of thousands have left the steppe for urban centers, particularly the capital.
As she boiled horsemeat dumplings, Enebold’s wife said they too might consider a move if they lost more livestock.
“The main challenge is accessibility of education for our children in the city,” she said.
Her husband had a more fundamental reason for staying.
“I want to keep herding my livestock,” he said. “I want to keep the same lifestyle as now.”
Why is Ethiopia’s Tigray again on the brink of conflict?
Power struggle within the once-dominant Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) party has sparked fears of renewed conflict
There is concern in Addis Ababa that Eritrea, its historic rival that gained independence from Ethiopia in 1993, will exploit the unrest
Updated 16 March 2025
AFP
ADDIS ABABA: More than two years after a peace deal ended the devastating war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region, a power struggle within the once-dominant TPLF party has sparked fears of renewed conflict.
Could these rising tensions lead to violence so soon after one of the century’s deadliest conflicts that killed an estimated 600,000 people?
The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) ran the whole of Ethiopia for nearly three decades until Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, a non-Tigrayan, took power in 2018.
His takeover led to months of tension with the TPLF leadership, eventually leading Abiy to send troops to Tigray in November 2020, accusing their forces of attacking federal army camps.
This triggered two years of horrific war between Tigrayan rebels and government forces backed by militias and Eritrean troops. It finally ended with a November 2022 peace treaty, known as the Pretoria Agreement.
A new interim administration was created in Tigray with TPLF veteran Getachew Reda in charge, though overseen by the federal government.
But divisions have emerged in recent months between Getachew and the TPLF’s leader, Debretsion Gebremichael.
Getachew faces criticism over delays in implementing the peace deal — particularly the failure to expel Eritrean forces who supported the federal government against the Tigrayans, and return the million people displaced by the war.
The Tigray Defense Forces (TDF) had previously stayed neutral in the Getachew-Debretsion dispute.
But in January, a dissident group within the TDF accused Getachew’s administration of undermining “the Tigrayan people’s national interest and engaging in treason.”
One foreign expert, who did not want to be named, estimated around 200 commanders supported the letter.
Getachew described it as declaring “a coup d’etat.”
In early March, he attempted to suspend three TDF generals and accused Debretsion’s faction of trying to “take over the whole of Tigray.”
This week, Debretsion’s forces took control of the municipalities in state capital Mekele and second city Adigrat, putting their own mayors in place.
General view of Mekele, the capital city of the Tigray region in northern Ethiopia. (AFP)
Many residents, already deeply weary of war, are panicking over the threat of renewed conflict with reports of bank runs and sold-out flights.
Getachew has asked for assistance from the federal government in Addis Ababa, though he said this should not be military in nature.
The federal government has not responded publicly.
There is concern in Addis Ababa that Eritrea, its historic rival that gained independence from Ethiopia in 1993, will exploit the unrest.
Eritrea’s rhetoric has been increasingly bellicose. Last month, its information minister accused Ethiopia of “waging an intense and unacceptable campaign against Eritrea” and committing “malicious provocations.”
A security source told AFP on condition of anonymity that armed Ethiopian convoys were heading toward the region of Afar, which borders Eritrea, in recent days.
Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki’s dissatisfaction with the 2022 peace agreement, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s ambitions for a Red Sea port and geopolitical interest from the Middle East have fueled the deteriorating tensions, said Kjetil Tronvoll, Oslo University professor specializing in the region.
That has left the “two countries inching closer to a new war,” he said.
