Carlos Alcaraz’s path to gold in his 100th Grand Slam match was rocky for Aryna Sabalenka and Coco Gauff, who both struggled through the fourth round of the Australian Open on Friday.
The TikTok generation had their moment in Melbourne Park the day after Stan Wawrinka, 40, led a parade of yesterday’s heroes through the third round.
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Iva Jovic, 18, defeated seventh seed Jasmine Paolini, 6-2, 7-6 (3), while Canadian 19-year-old Victoria Mboko defeated 14th seed Clara Tauson to book a last-16 blockbuster against twice-champion Sabalenka, a 7-6 (4), 7-6 (7) winner over Anastasia Potapova.
Alcaraz defeated French drop-shot merchant Corentin Moutet in a highlight-reel 6-2, 6-4, and 6-1 victory before 21-year-old Gauff recovered from her first set defeat to defeat fellow American Hailey Baptiste, 3-6, 6-0, 6-3.
Alcaraz, 22, who is aiming to win his first major at Melbourne Park, has vowed to become the youngest player to do so and has unstoppable behavior in his first week.
He defeated the flamboyant Moutet in the second match at Rod Laver Arena by chasing down a lob with a tweener before securing a passing shot down the line.
Moutet, the 32nd seed, is no slouch, but he was made the fall guy in Alcaraz’s “magic show,” taking on the spaniard for the 14th time in their unbeaten series of left-handers.
Alcaraz joked that chasing down Moutet’s drop shots became difficult despite the win’s ease.
He said, “I thought we were in a drop-shot competition, but undoubtedly he won.”
The Russian-born world number 55 Potapova, who distinguished herself on center court against her adopted country Austria, is the favorite to win the women’s title, but she had a tough time at Rod Laver Arena.
Sabalenka won the match point award while Potapova lost four of her remaining set points in the second frame.
She won 19 tiebreaks in succession last season, which makes her incredible unbeaten record to 21.
Every ball is crucial in the tiebreak, I am aware. Because it disappears, like, really quickly, you can’t lose your mind for even a second, Sabalenka told reporters.
You must be there to the fullest, therefore. That’s how I go about doing that. I simply continue to take it.”
In the Women’s Singles Third Round of the 2026 Australian Open at Melbourne Park, Aryna Sabalenka and Austrian Anastasia Potapova compete for the title.
Daniil Medvedev, a three-time men’s champion, once more gained confidence following a tense victory.
In the opening match at Margaret Court Arena, he defeated Hungary’s Fabian Marozsan, winning 6-7 (5) 4-6 7-5 6-0 6-3. He became the first player to win from two sets in this competition.
After being defeated by the young American in the second round last year, Medvedev will seek revenge on his mind when he faces Learner Tien for a spot in the quarterfinals.
In her Australian Open main draw debut, Mboko, one of the brightest young women’s tennis players, defeated Tauson 7-5, 75-7, 6-3, to reach the fourth round.
However, Zeynep Sonmez’s run was ended by wily Kazakh Yulia Putintseva at Melbourne Park in a three-setter victory.
World number 112 Sonmez was supported by Melbourne’s vibrant Turkish community, who decorated Kia Arena with red flags and gave them a gleeful taunt after winning, giving them kisses and dancing near her seat.
What are my options? She claimed to reporters and accused rowdy Sonmez fans of trying to put her off her serve, noting that some people do have tennis education, while others do not.
When Spain’s Alejandro Davidovich Fokina retired injured after trailing 6-1 6-1, Tommy Paul, the 19th seed, faced the brick wall of Alcaraz, which was a smooth transition into the fourth round.
Karolina Muchova, the 19th seed, defeated Magda Linette 6-1 6-1 to advance to the last-16 with a victory over Gauff.
In the evening match at Rod Laver Arena, third seed Alex Zverev takes on British danger man Cameron Norrie, sixth seed, and sixth seed Alex de Minaur, the sixth seed, in the prime of the evening at John Cain Arena.
A Singapore-flagged cargo ship carrying 21 Filipinos capsized in the disputed waters of the South China Sea, leaving four people missing, according to authorities in China and the Philippines, killing at least two sailors and salvaging 15 others.
After the boat capsized in the early hours of Friday, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) northwest of Scarborough Shoal (also known as Huangyan Dao), the Chinese Ministry of National Defense announced that the Chinese coastguard had sent two vessels to aid.
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The Philippines’ coastguard announced in a statement on Friday that it had sent two ships and two aircraft to help with the crew’s rescue of the cargo ship, which it called the Devon Bay.
According to a statement from China’s Southern Theater Command posted on social media site Weibo, the Chinese rescuers removed the bodies of at least 17 Filipino sailors from the water, 14 of whom were in stable condition, one of whom was receiving treatment, and two of whom had died.
After a cargo bound for Singapore capsized, China’s coastguard sent two ships to help the Filipino crew.
As the ship sailed to Guangdong province in the south of China on Thursday night, it lost contact with the Associated Press news agency.
The bulk carrier Devon Bay, which was en route to Yangjiang, sank in the South China Sea, according to the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore.
According to the statement, “MPA is in contact with the ship owner and relevant search and rescue authorities, and is providing support as needed,” adding that it will look into the incident.
Scarborough Shoal, a fish-rich region, is frequently the site of Chinese and Philippine ship showdowns.
The region’s sovereignty is still disputed, but China and the Philippines both claim it. After a standoff, China finally relinquished control of the area, where it has since stationed its coastguard and fishing vessels.
The Hague’s Permanent Court of Arbitration’s 2016 decision invalidated China’s extensive claims to the South China Sea and declared its blockade unlawful, confirming its status as a traditional fishing port for nations like the Philippines and Vietnam. The decision was rejected by China.
Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and other countries with exclusive economic jurisdictions are covered by China’s claims.
In the weeks since United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jonathan Ross shot and killed Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis, Minnesota, another ICE agent shot a Latino man in the leg, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
Good’s killing and the subsequent shooting have ignited a wave of calls and queries about whether ICE officers can be prosecuted. But the shootings in Minnesota are not outliers, and the history of ICE shootings shows that holding officers to account has been next to impossible.
I know, because I investigated the agency’s practices, obtaining documents that reveal how it operates and how its officers are trained to shield themselves from scrutiny and lawsuits. My 2024 investigation looked at six years of shootings informed by logs I obtained from the agency in a lawsuit. According to The Trace, a US outlet tracking gun violence in the country, ICE agents shot at least 12 people this and last year. From 2015 to 2021, ICE agents discharged a firearm at least 59 times, injuring 24 people and killing 23 others.
What is the likelihood of an ICE agent facing criminal charges by either federal or state agencies? Slim. None of the shootings I examined resulted in an ICE agent being indicted, even in cases where someone was killed.
Considered protected law enforcement documents, the agency’s training documents on use of force and firearms are not made public, nor are the agency’s use-of-force policies. What informs how agents operate in the field has largely been spared from scrutiny, but I obtained documents that shed light on what training some ICE agents received from 2007 to 2010.
Though the documents may now be outdated, they offer the only insight – apart from what little is available on the website of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers, where ICE agents receive law enforcement training – into what comprises use-of-force training for ICE agents.
Federal agents detain residents during a raid after a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent fatally shot Renee Nicole Good on January 7 during an immigration raid in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, on January 21, 2026 [Leah Millis/Reuters]
Agents are taught not to put themselves at ‘unnecessary risk’
According to one lesson in 2016, which is still available on FLETC, officers are allowed to react with force to the threat of violence and not just violence itself.
The lesson describes the following as a myth: “Deadly force can only be used as a last resort.” Establishing that policy and law are not the same, the lesson goes on to say, “The law requires officers to use objectively reasonable force, not the minimal force.”
Giving a warning or using minimal force or all other forms of force before shooting, the training said, could “create an unnecessary risk for the officer”.
In an undated set of quizzes with more than 100 questions, one multiple-choice question posed to an officer in training asks what actions from the Use of Force Continuum – guidelines detailing stages of escalating force law enforcement can use – they would have to apply before using deadly force.
The answer: “None, deadly force can be initiated immediately.”
An ICE training quiz asks officers about the use of deadly force. The correct answer suggests that officers can use it ‘immediately’ [Courtesy Lila Hassan/ Al Jazeera]
De-escalation not a priority
None of the documents I reviewed mentioned de-escalation.
The Department of Homeland Security, the federal body in charge of ICE, Customs and Border Protection and other federal law enforcement bodies, has a Use of Force policy that was amended in 2023 following an Executive Order issued by the Joe Biden administration.
This policy, which is the most recent, outlines mandatory training on de-escalation as part of an annual training on each agency’s respective use-of-force policies. The annual training is also meant to include “related legal updates” and “discretion in using deadly force and less than lethal force”.
The policy states that the training must be recorded, but whether or not the officers had actually received this annual training, both before and after the amendment of the policy, is unclear.
Following a 2016 shooting in which an ICE agent shot and permanently injured a Mexican man in Laurel, Mississippi, a civil lawsuit brought against the ICE agent revealed in a 2020 deposition that the agent only “vaguely” remembered his use-of-force training.
ICE does not make its Use of Force policy, most recently amended in 2023, available to the public, and no law requires it. The version on its website is almost entirely redacted. But legal representatives in a lawsuit against DHS and ICE cracking down on protests, obtained and made a copy of it available on their website.
This secrecy, say criminal justice experts, is a way for ICE agents to evade scrutiny for lacking policies to ensure or review that the force abides by its own rules.
“Public access of a complete version of ICE’s use-of-force policy is essential to understanding when agents are permitted to use violence within US cities and equally important to understanding when individual agents are potentially acting in violation of agency policy,” Cesar Cuauhtemoc Garcia Hernandez, a law professor of civil rights and civil liberties at Ohio State University, told Al Jazeera over email.
“Without access to the complete policy, it is next to impossible for ordinary people to carry out their responsibility in a democracy – decide whether they agree with ICE’s expectations of its officers, then lobby politicians and vote for candidates who embrace their vision of appropriate law enforcement conduct,” he added.
Gretta Goodwin, the author of a 2023 report by the Government Accountability Office – a nonpartisan research arm of the US Congress – found that ICE’s use-of-force documentation did not always detail when or how agents violated policy in instances of use of force.
That documentation is critical to improve training, Goodwin said. While researching the report, Goodwin said one of the objectives was to better understand how DHS tracks use-of-force training.
“We also wanted to know what was documented in relation to the training, because if ICE were documenting who took the training and when, then when use-of-force incidents happened that were counter to the training, it might help them decide to make modifications or better target the training.”
The lack of proper internal documentation, Goodwin explained, is a huge barrier to the DHS improving agents’ actions in the field.
Federal agents clash with protesters outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Minneapolis, Minnesota, during a demonstration over the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good on January 15, 2026 [Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu via Getty Images]
Evading lawsuits
The training documents also reveal an emphasis on teaching prospective agents how to get out from under lawsuits if they were to face them.
I found at least four different instances in which the lessons, quizzes, podcast transcripts or training lessons stressed the US Constitution’s Fourth Amendment rights, which protect people from unwarranted searches and seizures, indicating to the officer how to operate so that they do not violate them or how to articulate so that they can defend themselves.
In one podcast, a legal instructor said an agent might have to face a lawsuit for a violation of a tort, which is a harm committed either negligently or intentionally.
“As long as the employee was within the scope of employment [working as a federal agent] when the alleged negligent or intentional tort happened,” referring to a civil wrong, “they get to step out of that lawsuit.”
ICE agents, like all federal agents, also enjoy qualified immunity, a legal doctrine that protects them from the legal liability of these lawsuits.
“The law gives all law enforcement officers, including ICE, wide latitude to use force in carrying out their duties,” said Hernandez, the law professor at Ohio State University.
“The reality is that it is exceedingly difficult to hold individual agents or the agency itself accountable in court.”
Federal immigration officers arrest a protester outside Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on January 15, 2026 [Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu via Getty Images]
What next?
In the last year alone, the Department of Homeland Security more than doubled its workforce within ICE, bringing the agency from a total of 10,000 officers and agents to 22,000, with more recruiting plans under way.
How and whether they are receiving training remains unknown.
An NBC investigation based on sources with insider knowledge found that the race to employ new agents at scale entailed using AI tools that improperly processed applications and sent new agents into the field without proper training.
In Minneapolis, large protests and clashes with immigration agents are still under way, with at least 3,000 federal immigration forces mobilised in the city. Videos have captured ICE agents banging down doors of homes and dragging people out of cars.
Residents have reported that they are afraid to leave their homes and local efforts have even stepped up for people to do grocery shopping for their neighbours.
Vice President JD Vance and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have defended ICE agents despite widely criticised conduct. And US President Donald Trump has threatened to enact the Insurrection Act, a federal law that would allow him to deploy the military to the state. Earlier this week, sources told ABC News that 1,500 soldiers remain on standby for possible deployment.
Conor Gaffney, counsel at Protect Democracy, a nonprofit advocacy group tackling threats to democratic norms and institutions and defeating “the authoritarian threat”, told Al Jazeera that keeping policies secret while ICE continues its street operations undermines the trust of the community, an essential component of public safety.
“Keeping use-of-force policies secret obviously runs counter to transparency and accountability, which are basic principles of modern, community-oriented policing,” Gaffney told Al Jazeera.
Protect Democracy is part of a coalition of legal organisations challenging ICE’s conduct with protesters in Chicago Headline Club v Noem. In a transcript from the hearing of an ICE field officer who testified about training that ICE and Customs and Border Protection agents receive on use of force, crowd control, and how to use less-lethal munitions, the field officer said ICE agents did not have protest control training.
Republican attorneys have refuted Republican claims that the cases were politically motivated. Former US Special Counsel Jack Smith has defended his prosecution of President Donald Trump.
Testifying before lawmakers at the House Judiciary Committee, Smith said the two federal cases, one over Trump’s handling of classified documents and the other over efforts to overturn the 2020 election, were based on evidence, not politics.
In accordance with long-standing Department of Justice rule prohibiting the investigation or prosecution of a sitting president, both cases were dropped after Trump’s re-election in November 2024. Shortly before Trump’s inauguration in January 2025, Smith resigned.
The hearing marked the first time the US public heard at length from Smith since his resignation. He stated to the panel that he anticipated a criminal prosecution attempt by Trump’s Justice Department.
What are the main lessons learned?
What specifics do we know about the cases?
In November 2022, Smith was appointed to lead the Trump investigation.
He conducted two investigations into these two cases:
Classified documents
After taking office at the end of his first term, Smith allegedly looked into Trump’s handling of classified documents.
The US Espionage Act-related willful retention of national defense information counts as part of the criminal case, which is punishable by ten years in prison for each. Separate charges accused Trump of conspiring to obstruct justice and making false statements to investigators.
According to the prosecution, Trump allegedly removed highly sensitive documents from the White House when he assumed office in 2021 and later deposited them at his Florida Mar-a-Lago estate.
On August 15, 2022, a drone captured the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, where prosecutors claim he held top-secret documents.
2020 election results
The second case focused on Trump’s unsuccessful bid to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election. Trump allegedly sought to halt the constitutional transfer of power following the election rather than accept the outcome, according to the prosecution.
The charges followed a wide-ranging investigation into the events leading up to the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol. Trump faces charges of conspiring to defraud US citizens and violating the rights of voters on four counts.
Trump was not directly accused of inciting the Capitol riot, by Smith. Instead, the case centred on Trump’s actions in the weeks between his election defeat and the violence in Washington, examining efforts to pressure officials, advance false claims of fraud and interfere with the certification of the election results.
What were the main conclusions drawn from the testimony on Thursday?
No one should be a person of law, according to the saying.
Smith said his investigation into Trump was driven by evidence and the law.
“We followed the law and the facts,” the statement read. An indictment of a previously unreleased criminal scheme to obstruct the peaceful transfer of power, Smith said, was where that led.
“Our investigation developed proof beyond a reasonable doubt that President Trump engaged in criminal activity. Regardless of whether the former president was a Republican or a Democrat, I would pursue a former president if the same facts were presented today, Smith said in his opening remarks.
No one should be held accountable in this country because the law mandated that no one be above the law. So that is what I did”, Smith added.
The special counsel continued to say that he had not yet dropped Trump’s insurrection charge. Following the election of Trump in the House on January 6, the president was cleared of the Senate’s sole charge of inciting an uprising.
Cassidy Hutchinson
Republicans have long focused on challenging the testimony of former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, which was a key moment in the congressional investigation into the January 6 attack.
Hutchinson testified to the committee that she was aware that Trump had demanded to go to the US Capitol when he attempted to cram the steering wheel into his presidential vehicle. Other witnesses later disputed that account.
During the hearing, Republican Representative Jim Jordan, the committee’s chair, pressed Jack Smith on the episode. “Mr Smith, is Cassidy Hutchinson a liar?” Jordan asked.
Smith claimed that investigators couldn’t confirm Hutchinson’s claim because it was second-hand. He claimed that the Secret Service agent who was driving at the time did not verify the claim.
Jordan pressed whether Smith would have brought Hutchinson forward to testify anyway, and Smith said he had not made “any final determinations”.
Former aide to Mark Meadows, the Trump White House, testifies before the committee on January 6 [Andrew Harnik/AP Photo]
That response, Jordan claimed, demonstrated how determined prosecutors were to pursue Trump.
In fact, Smith said, one of the “central challenges” of the case was to present it in a concise way, “because we did have so many witnesses” – state officials, Trump campaign workers and advisers – to testify.
According to Smith, “some of the most powerful witnesses were witnesses who were actually fellow Republicans who had voted for Donald Trump, who had campaigned for him, and who wanted him to win the election.”
Threatening democracy
One Democrat, Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, asked how he would describe the consequences – for US democracy – of not holding Trump accountable for alleged violations of the law and his oath.
It can be catastrophic, according to Smith, “if we don’t hold the most powerful people in our society to the same standards of the rule of law.”
“It’s very simple to understand why people would believe they don’t have to follow the law as well,” he said.
Smith continued, “If we don’t hold people to account when they commit crimes, that it sends a message that those crimes are OK, that our society accepts that… It can endanger our election process, it can endanger election workers, and ultimately our democracy”.
Mark Schiefelbein/AP] Former Justice Department Special Counsel Jack Smith
“I don’t understand it,”
Smith sharply criticised Trump’s decision to issue mass pardons for people convicted in connection with the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
Trump granted clemency to hundreds of people who had been accused or found guilty of assaulting police officers on his first day in office.
When asked about the action, Smith responded, “The people who assaulted police officers and were later found guilty of a crime are dangerous to their communities,” in my opinion and what I think the judges who sentenced them to prison are. As you mentioned, some of these people have already committed crimes against their communities again, and I think all of us – if we are reasonable – know that there is going to be more crimes committed by these people in the future.
On Thursday, Smith said, “I don’t understand why you would mass pardon those who assaulted police officers.” I don’t understand it. I never will. “
At least 140 police officers were hurt, according to reports from the Capitol attack.
Smith defends his work
Republican lawmakers sought to portray Smith as an overly aggressive prosecutor who needed to be restrained by senior Justice Department officials as he pursued cases against Trump before the former president’s potential return to office.
They argued that Smith’s decision to obtain phone records for members of Congress, including then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, amounted to an overreach.
Republican Representative Brandon Gill of Texas allegedly accused Smith of using nondisclosure orders to “hide” subpoenas from both their targets and the general public during a heated exchange.
Smith rejected those claims, saying the collection of phone records was a routine investigative step aimed at understanding the” scope of the conspiracy “to overturn the 2020 election.
Smith claimed that “my office didn’t spy on anyone.”
He added that witnesses’ intimidation was the subject of nondisclosure orders, citing Trump’s public warnings that he would “be” coming after “people who crossed him.”
” I had grave concerns about obstruction of justice in this investigation, specifically with regards to Donald Trump, “Smith said.
According to Smith, “prosecutors are not required to wait until someone dies before moving for an order to protect the proceedings.”
Former Special Counsel Jack Smith testifies before the House Judiciary Committee [Kevin Lamarque/Reuters]
Trump responds
Trump gave the impression that he was closely following Smith’s testimony, posting on Truth Social as it went on, and praising Republicans’ treatment of the former special counsel.
“Deranged Jack Smith is being deposed before Congress,” the statement read. It was over when they discussed his past failures and unfair prosecutions, “Trump , wrote”. Under the pretense of legitimacy, he claimed to have saved many lives. “Jack Smith is a vicious animal who shouldn’t be permitted to practice law,” Smith said.
Trump framed the investigations as a” Democrat SCAM “and said those involved should” pay a big price”.
Vietnam’s Communist Party has re-appointed To Lam as its general secretary, extending his top leadership position in the Southeast Asian nation for the next five years.
To Lam was “unanimously” re-elected to the post of general secretary, according to an announcement made at the conclusion of the party’s five-yearly congress in the capital Hanoi on Friday.
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The party central committee “absolutely unanimously elected Comrade To Lam to continue holding the position of General Secretary”, the party said in a statement.
Tran Thanh Man, chairman of Vietnam’s National Assembly, said the party chief had received 180 votes out of 180 to remain in the top job.
Lam’s re-election as party chief will send a reassuring message to foreign investors who regularly cite political stability as a key factor in Vietnam’s appeal as a pro-business environment.
Lam, 68, is also seeking to become president, with a decision on that position expected to be announced later.
Vietnam’s re-elected Communist Party General Secretary To Lam is seen on a screen as he speaks during the closing session of the Communist Party of Vietnam’s (CPV) 14th National Congress, at the National Convention Center in Hanoi, on Friday [Nhac Nguyen/AFP]
Earlier this week, addressing hundreds of congress delegates seated in red-upholstered chairs in a red-carpeted conference hall under a towering statue of the Communist Party’s founder and liberation struggle hero, Ho Chi Minh, Lam promised to continue fighting corruption and ensure annual growth above 10 percent through to 2030.
Speaking at the end of the congress and his reappointment on Friday, Lam committed to working hard to meet the expectations of Vietnam’s people.
Lam’s retaining of the top party position follows his implementation of sweeping reforms since taking over as Communist Party General Secretary in late 2024, which have shocked the country with their speed and severity for some sectors.
He has eliminated whole layers of government bureaucracy, abolished eight ministries or government agencies and cut nearly 150,000 jobs from the state payroll, while pushing ambitious rail and power projects as well as weeding out corruption.
Lam said in a speech this week that he wants to change the country’s economic growth model, which has hinged for decades on cheap labour and exports, instead turning Vietnam into a high-middle-income economy by 2030 by focusing on innovation and efficiency.
He also warned of the overlapping threats Vietnam faces “from natural disasters, storms and floods to epidemics, security risks, fierce strategic competition, and major disruptions in energy and food supply chains”.
Kiev, Ukraine – As people attempted to cross the treacherous streets of Podil in the near-darkness, the sound of several petrol generators echoed across the historic neighborhood.
After extensive Russian aerial strikes on Ukraine’s infrastructure in recent weeks, about half the capital’s residents are without heating or power.
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The temperature is not above zero.
Young people in Kyiv gathered in a row of cafes and bars as an air raid siren blares. Heating, light, and music can be provided by generators.
After numerous attacks on energy infrastructure, almost no one is inside Independence Square in Kyiv.
Karina Sema, a 24-year-old journalist, told Al Jazeera, “It’s really important for the youth to meet up and do things together so we don’t break down mentally.”
A video from the day before was shown on her phone after she took out her phone. A song called All I Need Is Your Love Tonight can be heard by about 100 people singing along to the song in torchlight around a speaker.
The most recent major attack occurred on Tuesday night when Russian forces fired drones and ballistic missiles at the entire country, causing darkness in the city and even the Ukrainian Parliament as repair workers began to restore some of the grid’s components following an earlier in January assault.
State of emergency
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been the subject of numerous attacks that have prompted the president to declare a state of emergency in the energy sector. He claims that Russia purposefully stoops up the bitter cold snap to start a war.
Volker Turk, the UN’s representative for human rights, called the strikes “cruel” and a “clear violation of international law.”
Water pipes in some buildings burst due to lack of heating, which causes flooding as the water freezes.
Residents of a neighborhood on the left bank of the capital’s capital, which has experienced repeated drone strikes and no electricity, reported several creative solutions to the crisis.
A portable petrol-powered stove can be used to warm a brick, which helps to warm the apartment and retains heat for a long time after the stove is turned off.
Assiya Melnyk, a single mother in her 30s, showed Al Jazeera around her apartment, which had had no electricity for the whole day.
“My eyesight is going because I squint in the dark for so long”, she said, holding a small torch.
“It is hard to stay warm, we use jumpers and blankets, I just think of my daughter and keeping her well mentally and physically”, she said.
Economic impact
The attacks on infrastructure also hurt business owners who have struggled for almost four years under a wartime economy.
Enes Lutfia, a 24-year-old originally from Turkiye, told Al Jazeera that he is now considering closing his restaurants and bars.
It costs him almost $500 a week to fuel his generator.
“I have no customers”, he said. “Young people hang out together on the street or at home, many adult men are fighting, many women have left the country”, he said with a resigned shrug.
Defending the country’s energy sector is also costing Ukraine.
Zelenskyy said the air defence missiles used after Tuesday’s attack cost about $90 million.
‘ You stay with your own mind ‘
It is not just Kyiv that has been affected. Cities such as Kharkiv in the east and Odesa in the south have also suffered near darkness.
In central Ukraine’s Poltava, Anatoli, a 54-year-old car mechanic, told Al Jazeera he now gets electricity only for a few hours at night. He works in his garage in the early morning hours when the lights are on.
He is considering leaving Ukraine.
“I will leave as soon as they open the borders”, he said.
In a restaurant in the city’s centre, 23-year-old Maxim Senschuk told Al Jazeera that staying at home with no electricity can affect a person’s mental state: “You stay with your own mind”.
He bemoaned a “psychological war on society”, but added, “All my family, friends, we are not scared, it has been four years]of war]. We are simply fed up with this right now.
[Nils Adler/Al Jazeera] Maxim Senchuk shows an app that displays the time of day and time of day.
