Category World News

Bangladesh on edge after killing of 2024 uprising activist triggers unrest

By in News, World News
After overnight violence broke out over the death of a prominent youth leader of the uprising in 2024, Bangladesh’s security forces have taken control of the capital, Dhaka, and other major cities, igniting fears of further unrest ahead of the country’s national elections in February.

After protests turned violent late on Thursday, police and paramilitary units increased patrols in Dhaka, aiming specifically at political buildings, media buildings, and cultural institutions. Residents reported high tensions, especially before Friday morning prayers, even though the streets were largely calm on Friday morning.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

The unrest came after Sharif Osman Hadi, a 32-year-old spokesperson for Platform for Revolution, passed away. As Hadi launched his campaign last Friday in Dhaka, he was shot in the head by masked attackers.

He was flown to Singapore for advanced care, where he passed away after six days on life support, first at a nearby hospital.

Hadi was a key figure in the student-led uprising that forced Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to flee the nation last year. Hadi was also known for his outspoken criticism of India, while Inquilab Mancha describes itself as a “revolutionary cultural platform inspired by the spirit of uprising.”

Protesters detained the English-language Daily Star and Prothom Alo, Bangladesh’s largest daily newspaper, on Thursday night. Later, firefighters extinguished the blaze at The Daily Star while ensuring security for journalists trapped inside.

Protesters chanted slogans praising Hadi’s name, promising to keep the demonstrations going, and pleading for swift justice. As more force was used by authorities to avert further violence, several neighborhoods continued to be tense.

Government is under increasing pressure.

Since August 2024, when Hasina, a long-time leader, fled to India after a mass protests, the interim administration has been in place there under the leadership of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus.

Hasina’s Awami League is prohibited from participating in the February 12 election, and the government is under increasing pressure for delayed reforms.

In a televised address after Hadi’s passing, Yunus stated that the country’s political and democratic spheres were irreplaceable. He urged calm, urged transparency in the investigation, and warned that violence could threaten the vote’s legitimacy.

The interim administration held special prayers throughout the country and a day of state mourning on Saturday.

Hasina’s violent legacy still exists

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh’s first president and Hasina’s murdered father, was also targeted twice last year by protesters who tore through his home. Awami League offices were bulldozed in Rajshahi, and several districts’ highways were blocked.

Anti-India sentiment has grown since Hasina’s flight to New Delhi, and violence has also spread to Chittagong, where protesters have attacked the Indian Assistant High Commission.

Hasina was sentenced to death in November by hanging and then guilty of crimes against humanity for ordering a bloody siege against a student-led uprising that ended up killing her.

After weeks of student-led protests against her “autocratic rule,” Hasina fled Bangladesh on August 5, 2024 by helicopter.

Sajjat Hosen Sojal, the mother of 20-year-old student Sajjat Hosen, was shot and burned by the police shortly before Hasina was forced to resign and flee the country, according to Shaina Begum, who told Al Jazeera after the verdict: “I cannot be calm until she is brought back and hanged in this country.”

Protesters burn buildings in Bangladesh after youth leader killed

By in News, World News
NewsFeed

After the death of youth leader Sharif Osman Hadi, violent protests erupted in Bangladesh. The HQ of the biggest daily newspaper was among the buildings that were destroyed by protesters who also demolished and vandalized offices. Elections are scheduled for the first election in the upcoming year.

Published On 19 Dec 2025

EU agrees hefty $105bn Ukraine loan without using Russian assets

By in News, World News

According to Antonio Costa, president of the EU Council, EU leaders have agreed to give Ukraine an interest-free loan to meet its military and economic needs over the next two years.

The leaders made the decision early on Friday to use frozen Russian assets to pay for Ukraine’s defense of Russia, according to diplomats.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, thanked the EU for its loan, which “truly strengthens” Kyiv’s defense.

Zelenskyy said on X that “this is significant support that truly strengthens our resilience.” He continued, “It is crucial that Russian assets remain immobilized and that Ukraine has a financial security guarantee for the foreseeable future.”

There is a deal, we say. The decision to support Ukraine for 2026-27 with 90 billion euros [105.5%] was approved. In a post on social media early on Friday, Costa said, “We committed, we delivered.”

After EU leaders worked hard into Thursday night’s agreement, Costa did not reveal the source of the funding.

However, an early draft of the summit’s conclusions, which was spotted by the Reuters news agency, stated that they would be made by the bloc’s controversial plan to use frozen Russian assets as a loan to support Ukraine’s war effort, secured by the EU budget.

EU governments and the European Parliament will continue to talk about establishing a loan to Ukraine based on assets held by the Russian central bank.

According to the text, the agreement on Friday won’t have an impact on Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic’s financial obligations, which both declined to contribute to financing Ukraine.

After EU leaders decided to borrow money to pay for Ukraine instead of using Russia’s frozen assets, Kirill Dmitriev, Russia’s special envoy for investment and economic cooperation, said on Friday that “law and sanity prevailed.”

Dmitriev, who mentions European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, said on X that “Major BLOW to EU warmongers led by failed Ursula … voices of reason in the EU BLOCKED the ILLEGAL use of Russian reserves to finance Ukraine.

Once Moscow repairs its war damage, Kyiv will only be able to repay the EU loan based on joint borrowing. According to the text, the EU has reserved the right to use the frozen assets to pay off the loan, but the Russians will continue to do so until then.

One unnamed EU diplomat told Reuters, “It’s good in the sense that Ukraine will receive funding for two years.

Leaders had flocked to the decision, which came after hours of discussions about the technical and legal details of a loan based on frozen Russian assets, which diplomats claimed were too complicated or politically difficult to resolve at this point.

A second EU diplomat said, “We have gone from saving Ukraine to saving face, at least among those who have been pressing for the use of the frozen assets.”

The main challenge in using Russian money was to provide sufficient guarantees against financial and legal retaliation from Moscow for Belgium, where 185 billion euros ($217 billion) of the total 210 billion euros ($246 billion) of frozen assets are held.

Should the Kremlin’s plan to use its assets go ahead, it had stated that it would file legal suits against Russia and seize foreign assets.

divided Europe

Analysts had predicted that using frozen Russian assets as the only viable option for EU funding of Ukraine’s war effort prior to Friday’s decision. German state assets, which were not even taken during World War II, would be an unprecedented development, according to the proposal.

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz had warned that the chances of reaching an agreement remained “50-50” prior to Thursday’s meeting.

Bart De Wever, the prime minister of Belgium, had previously expressed his concern over the legal and financial risks to the European Parliament because he had previously argued that Belgium might be required to pay compensation to Russia if courts later determined that using the frozen assets was against the law.

Belgium demanded assurances that Russian assets held outside of Belgium would also be used, as well as binding commitments from other EU states to cover all potential liabilities.

Some nations, like Germany and the Netherlands, said they were willing to back up the loan, while others, like Italy and Bulgaria, resisted.

Five killed as US military destroys two more vessels in Pacific Ocean

By in News, World News

Published On 19 Dec 2025

United States forces have killed five more people on board vessels in the Pacific Ocean, bringing the death toll from the Trump administration’s military campaign against alleged seaborne drug traffickers to at least 104 since September.

The US military’s Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said on Friday that it carried out “lethal kinetic strikes on two vessels” in the eastern Pacific at the instruction of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, killing three people in one vessel and two in another.

Recommended Stories

list of 4 itemsend of list

Thursday’s attack by US forces comes one day after a strike on another vessel, also in international waters in the eastern Pacific, which killed four people, SOUTHCOM said.

While the US military said the nine victims of the attacks over two days were “male narco-terrorists”, Washington has provided no proof that the almost 30 vessels destroyed since September in the Pacific and Caribbean, resulting in more than 100 dead, were involved in drug trafficking.

Defence Secretary Hegseth is also under intense scrutiny for reportedly ordering a second strike on survivors who clung to floating boat debris after an earlier attack on a vessel – attacking shipwreck survivors is considered a war crime, according to legal experts.

Latin American leaders and law experts have branded the US attacks “extrajudicial killings” while Trump has sought to justify the killings as necessary to halt drug trafficking into the US from Latin American drug cartels, particularly those based in Venezuela.

Trump has also ordered a huge military deployment to Latin America and has threatened to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro from power, accusing him of overseeing a drug trafficking cartel.

Earlier this week, Trump raised the stakes by ordering a “total” naval blockade of all oil tankers – that are under US sanctions – from entering or leaving Venezuelan ports, a move designed to restrict the country’s oil resources and hobble the economy.

Maduro has blasted Washington’s military mobilisation and accused Trump of using the pretext of fighting drug trafficking as a cover for “regime change” in Venezuela and stealing the country’s oil reserves.

Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Thursday that he was willing to mediate between the US and Venezuela to “avoid armed conflict”.

Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum also offered to act as a mediator to find “a peaceful solution so that there is no US intervention”.

Lula, one of Latin America’s most influential leaders, told reporters that Brazil was “very worried” about the mounting crisis between Washington and Caracas.

Lula said he told Trump that “things wouldn’t be resolved by shooting, that it was better to sit down around a table to find a solution”.

“I am at the disposal of both Venezuela and the US to contribute to a peaceful solution on our continent”.

Lula also said he was concerned about what was behind the US campaign.

“It can’t just be about overthrowing Maduro. What other areas of interest are there that we are yet to be aware of? He continued, adding that he had no idea whether Venezuela’s oil, crucial minerals, or rare earths were the culprits.

No one ever articulates the need for this war, he continued.

Man suspected in Brown U shooting, MIT professor’s killing found dead

By in News, World News

Published On 19 Dec 2025

A man has been found dead in a rented apartment at a New Hampshire storage facility after being accused of killing two and wounding several people in a mass shooting at Brown University in the US state of Rhode Island, and of killing a professor from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Rhode Island, according to officials.

Former Brown student and Portuguese national Claudio Neves Valente, 48, was discovered dead on Thursday evening from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to Providence police chief Colonel Oscar Perez at a press conference.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

According to Perez, the suspect acted alone, according to Perez. According to the US attorney for Massachusetts, Leah B. Foley, investigators believe Neves Valente was to blame for the fatal shooting of MIT professor and Brown’s fatal shooting at his home on Monday.

In the Brown University shooting that occurred in large numbers on Saturday, two people were killed and nine others were hurt.

Authorities said they were looking into a link between the Brown mass shooting and the fatal shooting of 47-year-old MIT professor Nuno FG Loureiro on Thursday, and the investigation had dramatically changed.

Neves Valente attended Brown from the fall of 2000 through the spring of 2001, according to Brown University President Christina Paxson. She claimed that “he has no current affiliation with the university.” Between 1995 and 2000, Neves Valente and Loureiro both attended the same academic program at the same Portuguese university, according to Foley.

Prior to now, the FBI claimed to be aware of no connections between the two shootings.

After Wednesday’s news conference, a second person who had been linked to the suspect came forward and “blow the lid” on the case, according to Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha.

According to Foley, investigators located the Rhode Island-based vehicle Neves Valente rented in Boston. Outside of Brown University, that vehicle was seen.

The suspect, according to Foley, added a Maine number plate to the rental car’s plate to help conceal his identity after leaving Rhode Island for Massachusetts.

Neves Valente entered a condominium complex close to Loureiro’s on video. According to Foley, he was spotted entering the storage facility about an hour later after his death was discovered.