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A curated weekday guide to major news and developments over the past 24 hours. Here’s today’s news.
RUSSIA-UKRAINE DEVELOPMENTS
Russia’s General Sergei Surovikin, an ally of Yevgeny Prigozhin, has reportedly been removed from his leadership role in the war on Ukraine and is under house arrest. Surovikin, known for his aggressive tactics, has not been seen in public since the failed armed action by Prigozhin’s paramilitary organization Wagner group. “There is no official investigation, but Surovikin spent a long time in limbo answering uncomfortable questions,” a blog considered close to Russia’s security forces reported over the weekend. Elisa Braun and Zoya Sheftalovich report for POLITICO.
Russia’s armed raid on a vessel off Turkey’s coast that was bound for Ukraine on Sunday will likely test Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan’s resolve to maintain good relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Erdogan has invited Putin to Turkey to discuss the revival of the U.N.-backed Black Sea grain deal. Turkey, NATO’s second-largest military, has not publicly commented on the incident. Jonathan Spicer and Ece Toksabay report for Reuters.
The first vessel carrying Ukrainian agricultural goods set sail from Odesa yesterday, despite Russian threats to forcibly stop ships in the Black Sea. Last week, Ukraine’s navy announced that “temporary corridors” had been established for “merchant vessels going to and from Ukrainian ports.” Yesterday, the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine said that the United States sent 50 railroad wagons to Ukraine “to help move grain to Danube ports, where it will be sent to global markets.” David L. Stern reports for the Washington Post.
Stian Jenssen, the chief of staff to the NATO secretary general, has apologized for saying that Ukraine could give up territory to Russia in order to join NATO and end the war. “I think that a solution could be for Ukraine to give up territory and get NATO membership in return,” Jenssen said on Tuesday. Yesterday he clarified, “My statement about this was part of a larger discussion about possible future scenarios in Ukraine, and I shouldn’t have said it that way. It was a mistake.” His clarification suggests that exchanging land for NATO membership may still be a possible outcome. Dan Sabbagh reports for the Guardian.
GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS – NIGER
At least 17 soldiers have been killed and 20 wounded following a jihadist ambush in Niger. This marks the seventh attack on the military since the junta took power three weeks ago. Chris Ewokor reports for BBC News.
West African military chiefs are meeting today to prepare for a possible military intervention in Niger if diplomatic efforts to restore civilian rule fail. Niger’s junta previously said expressed openness to talks. This week, Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke to Mali’s military leadership about the coup in Niger, which Western governments may fear indicates Russia’s growing influence in the region. Felix Onuah reports for Reuters.
OTHER GLOBAL DEVELOPMENTS
The paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in Sudan killed hundreds of non-Arabs as they fled El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur, evidence gathered by CNN indicates. Tamara Qiblawi, Allegra Goodwin, Nima Elbagir, and Celine Alkhaldi report for CNN.
Over 60 people are feared dead after a migrant boat was found off Cape Verde in West Africa. While exact figures are difficult to determine, between 2020 and 2023, at least 67,000 people arrived in the Canary Islands, a Spanish archipelago. Over 2,500 deaths have been recorded along that route in that period, though figures are likely higher. Joe Inwood, Suzanne Leigh, and Christy Cooney report for BBC News.
The Biden administration appears to be delaying the renewal of a military assistance program to Azerbaijan as warnings of ethnic cleansing in the breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh grow. The waiver to provide aid has been renewed before the summer of each year since 2002. This year it has not yet been renewed. While no explanation for the delay has been offered, it coincides with growing concern that Azerbaijan is worsening a humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh. Eric Bazail-Eimil and Gabriel Gavin report for POLITICO.
Germany yesterday walked back a legal commitment to meeting NATO’s target of spending 2 percent of GDP on defense annually. Germany’s government has instead reiterated its commitment to meet the spending target on average over five years. Peter Wilke reports for POLITICO.
U.S. RELATIONS
President Biden will endeavor to strengthen the growing trilateral relationship between the United States, South Korea, and Japan with a summit at Camp David tomorrow. This comes as South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol commemorated his country’s 1945 independence from Japan this week. The commemoration did not dwell on the brutal Japanese occupation, focusing instead on their “partnership.” Trevor Hunnicutt, Hyonhee Shin, and Sakura Murakami report for Reuters.
Sixty-six percent of Americans believe the United States “needs to do more to prepare for military threats from China.” While 58 percent of Democrats in the poll said the U.S. should boost preparations, 81 percent of Republicans said the same. Thirty-eight percent of Americans would support deploying the U.S. military to Taiwan if China attacked. Julia Shapero reports for The Hill.
DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS – TRUMP LEGAL MATTERS
Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has sought a Mar. 4 trial start for the racketeering case against former President Trump and his allies in Georgia. Trump is likely to oppose the proposed Mar. 4 date. Legal experts have said such a short timetable is unlikely given the many defendants and charges in the case. Cameron McWhirter and Jan Wolfe report for the Wall Street Journal.
Former President Trump and his allies are testing District Judge Tanya Chutkan’s direction to avoid making “inflammatory statements” that could be considered intimidating. Trump has since posted on his social media platform, Truth Social, that Chutkan “obviously wants me behind bars. VERY BIASED & UNFAIR.” In another post, Trump ally Mike Davis posted a photo of Chutkan with a caption falsely claiming she had “openly admitted she’s running election interference against Trump.” Maggie Haberman, Jonathan Swan, and Alan Feuer report for the New York Times.
Abigail Jo Shry, a Texas woman, has been charged with threatening to kill District Judge Tanya Chutkan, handling the criminal case against former President Trump’s alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Shry, who used a racial slur in her threat to Chutkan and said that “If Trump doesn’t get elected in 2024, we are coming to kill you.” Shry allegedly also threatened to kill congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, a black Texas Democrat running for mayor of Houston. BBC News reports.
Even if re-elected, former President Trump could not pardon himself or direct the Justice Department to dismiss the racketeering charges against him in Georgia because the indictment only involves state crimes. Even Georgia governors cannot issue pardons. Pardons are issued by the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles, and applications are considered after an individual has completed at least five years of their sentence. Erica Orden and Kyle Cheney report for POLITICO.
DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS – SOCIAL MEDIA
X, formerly known as Twitter, added a five-second delay when a user clicked on links to sites that owner Elon Musk dislikes, such as Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky, and Substack, as well as the Reuters wire service and the New York Times. X has since begun reversing the delay times back to zero. It was unclear if all the throttled websites had normal service restored. Jeremy B. Merrill and Drew Harwell report for the Washington Post.
Forty-seven percent of American adults said they somewhat supported “banning the social media application, TikTok, from use in the United States.” Fifty-eight percent of Republicans favored a ban, compared to 47% of Democrats. Michael Martina and David Shepardson report for Reuters.
New York City yesterday banned TikTok on government-owned devices, citing security concerns. Kanishka Singh reports for Reuters.
Survivors and family members of victims of the 2022 mass shooting in Buffalo, New York, filed two lawsuits against YouTube, Reddit, and several gun-related companies following a report that the shooter was “radicalized” online. Jacob Knutson reports for Axios.
OTHER DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENTS
New details of a Philadelphia police shooting suggest the fatally shot driver did not lunge at officers as the police claimed but remained seated in his car. On Monday, a police spokesperson said that after initially fleeing from officers, the driver got out of the car with his knife, ignored commands to drop it, and then “lunged” at the officers before one shot him. This account was untrue, Danielle M. Outlaw, the Philadelphia police commissioner, later clarified. Joel Wolfram and Campbell Robertson report for the New York Times.
Eight inmates at a San Francisco Bay prison filed a lawsuit yesterday against the federal Bureau of Prisons, alleging sexual abuse and exploitation have continued despite the prosecution of the former warden and several former officers. The Bureau of Prisons failed to tackle misconduct and protect the safety of those in its care who have had to endure “rape, groping, voyeurism, forced stripping, sexually explicit comments on an everyday basis and so much more,” Amaris Montes, an attorney at Rights Behind Bars, said. Olga R. Rodriguez reports for AP News.
Hawaii’s biggest power utility has been accused of being negligent and knowingly failing to take proper action to prevent the deadliest wildfire in modern American history in a lawsuit filed yesterday. The plaintiffs accused the utility company of years of inaction and negligence, arguing that it should have had plans to shut down power systems before fierce winds blew across Hawaii. Phil McCausland, Lewis Kamb and Daniel Arkin report for NBC News.
Voting rights activists and Republican officials are clashing over whether felons should be able to vote once they served their punishments. By and large, Republicans oppose felons voting, while Democrats say the ability to vote is a crucial step toward rehabilitation. Felons are four times as likely as non-felons to be Democrats or politically unaffiliated, a 2019 study found. Eugene Scott reports for Axios.