Category World News

Although the details of a deal reached on Sunday were still being worked out, it appeared that Russia and Ukraine have stopped focusing on one another’s energy infrastructure this week.

“I can confirm that since this date, March 25 … there have been no attacks on energy objects. Heorhii Tykhyi, a spokesman for the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told the Kyiv Independent on Thursday that neither Russia’s energy objects nor our energy objects were targeted by them.

The United States appeared to have abandoned the comprehensive ceasefire proposal it signed with Ukraine on March 11 when reaching the partial ceasefire agreement.

Russian President Vladimir Putin rejected it a week later during a phone call with US President Donald Trump, and negotiated a vaguely defined ceasefire on energy and infrastructure instead, to which Ukraine was not a party.

Following negotiations between Ukrainian and Russian negotiating teams, the US finally agreed to sign the smaller deal in Jeddah.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had said on Sunday evening that “a ceasefire in our energy sector can begin today”.

Ukraine was previously accused of violating the ceasefire by Russia.

The Russian Federation’s Ministry of Defense reported that the [Kyiv] regime continued to attack the country’s energy infrastructure despite Zelensky’s public statement.

It accused Ukraine of launching two attack drones over Crimea on Wednesday night targeting an underground gas storage facility, and of launching another drone against a high-tension power line in the Russian regions of Bryansk and Kursk, causing a cascade of blackouts.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces’ General Staff denies the claims made.

According to them, “the aggressor country’s military department makes false and unfounded accusations in order to prolong the war.”

The governors of Crimea, Kursk and Bryansk did not report Ukrainian UAVs in their airspace, as they usually do.

Over the past ten days, Russia has been engaging in diplomatic messaging, accusing Ukraine of violating ceasefires that it had agreed to.

It alleged that Ukraine had destroyed a gas measuring station in Sudzha, in the Kursk region of Russia, on Friday.

Ukraine’s General Staff said Sudzha was “shelled by the Russians themselves” in a “campaign to discredit Ukraine”.

Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman for the Kremlin, responded with a retaliation. He claimed that Ukraine’s denial “shows how much one can trust the Kyiv regime.”

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova piled on, too.

Ukraine “already attacked the Russian power facility in violation of the United States’ proposed truce.” The question is now how Washington will continue to operate under the “mad terrorist scum.”

Sudzha is the point where a major Russian gas pipeline crosses into Ukraine.

After Russia drastically reduced gas flows to Europe in 2022, the pipeline was essentially defunct, and it ended on December 31 when a Russian-Ukraine transit contract expired.

Over the course of three years of conflict, Ukraine had numerous opportunities to obliterate or shut down Russian gas pipelines that had been crossing its territory.

Russia says Ukraine wants to ‘ thwart ‘ peace plans

Russia’s emphasis on Ukraine’s unreliability has been a constant theme throughout the conflict, and it has grown in recent days in an effort to obstruct its ability to negotiate.

For instance, on March 18, when Putin switched to a partial ceasefire, the Kremlin unilaterally announced that the Ukrainian ceasefire would go into effect immediately and without any prior consent.

Two days later, Zakharova accused Kyiv of violating the ceasefire by attacking the Engels air force base in Russia.

By attacking Russian energy facilities, Zakharova said, “Kyiv wants to thwart peace initiatives, including those proposed by Trump.”

Zelenskyy’s government “exhibited a complete lack of political will for peace,” she claimed.

That attack targeted ammunition, Ukraine’s General Staff said on Thursday. 96 air-launched cruise missiles were destroyed as a result of secondary detonations. According to the staff, the missiles were used in three airstrikes against Ukraine in March and April.

Russia’s Defence Ministry, on the other hand, admitted to striking Ukrainian energy facilities on the first night of Putin’s unilateral ceasefire, and on the following night.

Russia and Ukraine exchanged 175 prisoners of war each, and Russia also gave birth to 22 hospitalized soldiers on March 18. One aspect of the phone call clearly worked.

Russia continued to communicate even on Sunday.

As the agreement was announced, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov denounced Zelenskyy in an interview with Russia’s Channel One, saying, “We cannot take this man at his word”.

Russia used 139 Shahed drones and an Iskander-M ballistic missile to attack Ukraine the same day. 78 of them were fatally shot by Ukraine, disorienting 34 of them electronically.

But other Russian attacks were deadly. A father and his 5-year-old daughter were among the three victims of the drone strike in Kyiv on Saturday. In a drone strike on Friday in Zaporizhia, three people were killed.

The White House did not respond to Russian assertions, spending the week in a defensive crouch after its top national security officials were revealed to have discussed operational defence plans against Yemeni Houthis on a commercial platform, and inadvertently included a journalist in that discussion.

Regarding ceasefire terms, the EU and the US are very different.

After separate Russian, Ukrainian, and US statements that didn’t align, Ukrainian and Russian technical teams were reportedly working out issues with Sunday’s agreement.

In addition to banning strikes on energy infrastructure, the White House said, the agreement aimed to secure safe navigation in the Black Sea and “help restore Russia’s access to the world market for agricultural and fertiliser exports”.

Russia went further, claiming that sanctions against Russian agricultural machinery and shipping could only be lifted if the deal were to become legally binding.

Zelenskyy denied that the US and Ukrainian teams had reached an agreement regarding Russian access to the grain and fertilizer markets.

“We believe that this is a weakening of positions and a relaxation of sanctions”, Zelenskyy told reporters in Kyiv on Tuesday. “This was not on our agenda,” we said.

Zelenskyy and the European Union came to terms.

The European Council of the 27 EU leaders said on March 20 that it “remains ready to step up pressure on Russia, including through further sanctions and by strengthening the enforcement of existing measures … to weaken its ability to continue waging its war of aggression”.

It stated that Russian central bank assets worth $300 billion would remain frozen “until Russia stops its aggression against Ukraine and makes reparations for the harm it caused.”

Anitta Hipper, a spokesman for the European Commission’s foreign affairs, reiterated that statement on Wednesday, saying the EU would consider lifting sanctions if Russia “puts end to its unprovoked aggression” and to withdrew without condition.

The situation on the ground

Throughout the week, Ukraine fought back against continuing Russian assaults that focused on the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine.

Russian forces are weakening, according to Viktor Tregubov, a spokesperson for the Khortytsia operational group of Ukrainian ground forces.

“There are fewer of them, and they have less equipment. He claimed on Saturday that the men fighting there claim to be seeing fewer Russians at the moment. Simply put, “Russia has suffered significant losses.” But they cannot leave this area, because it is still part of their plans to control this part of the Donetsk region”, he said.

Colonel General Oleksandr Syrskii, the commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, reported rising daily casualty rates in Russia. In the last three years of combat, 540 000 Russians have been killed and wounded, exceeding the 900 000 mark, according to reports.

Ukraine’s General Staff on Thursday said a drone strike on the Engels-2 airfield in Russia a week earlier had resulted in the destruction of 96 air-launched cruise missiles from secondary detonations. According to them, the missiles were used in three airstrikes against Ukraine in March and April.

In the Russian region of Kursk, Ukraine has experienced a setback in the past two weeks as a result of a counterinvasion last summer.

One of Ukraine’s stated reasons for that initiative was that it forestalled a new invasion Russia was preparing in its Sumy and Kharkiv regions in the autumn.

Now that Ukraine has been resurrected in Kursk, Zelenskyy told French newspaper Le Figaro on Wednesday.

Russian reconnaissance and sabotage groups were already advancing further into the Sumy region, according to Ukrainian Border Guard spokesman Andriy Demchenko, who spoke to a telethon.

“The enemy does not give up its sabotage activities. In the north of Sumy, the majority of enemy reconnaissance and sabotage organizations were previously exposed. We are now recording enemy groups’ attempts to move closer to the southeast and the southern regions of Sumy, he said, when they attempt to cross the state border.

Demchenko also told a telethon that Russian forces were conducting shelling and air attacks in Sumy. At the height of Ukraine’s Kursk operation, these activities had almost stopped.

At least 300 Russian strikes were recorded by Sumy police in 43 different settlements on the day of the agreement in Jeddah.

At the beginning of March, an expansive clandestine crematorium was discovered on a ranch in the western Mexican state of Jalisco, complete with burned human remains and 200 pairs of shoes. According to local officials, the apparent extermination site was likely operated by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which also reportedly used the ranch as a recruitment and training centre.

As Al Jazeera correspondent John Holman noted in a video dispatch following the discovery, the “strange thing” was that Mexican authorities had “seized the ranch five months ago, but reported none of the infrastructure” located there. Instead, it took a group of volunteers dedicated to the search for Mexico’s missing people to unearth the underground ovens.

Out of Mexico’s 32 states, Jalisco is the one with the most disappeared people, which numbered more than 15,000 as of the end of February. Countrywide, the official tally of victims of enforced disappearance and missing people reached 125,802 on March 26, although this figure is without doubt a grave underestimate given the frequent reluctance of family members of the missing to denounce such crimes for fear of reprisal.

Cases of enforced disappearance in Mexico began to soar – along with homicides – in 2006, the year that then-Mexican President Felipe Calderon launched the so-called “war on drugs” with the encouragement and backing of his charitable gringo counterpart George W Bush.

As has pretty much been par for the course with all ostensible global anti-narcotic endeavours orchestrated by the United States, the Mexican drug war did nothing to curb international drug traffic but much to render the country’s landscape ever more blood-soaked. After all, hyper-militarising Mexico in the name of fighting drugs does not resolve the fundamental issue of sky-high demand for illicit substances in the US itself, the criminalisation of which is what makes their trafficking so lucratively appealing to organised crime outfits.

Nor, to be sure, does the inundation of Mexico with US-manufactured weapons help matters, though it does enable the arms industry to continue making a killing off of killing.

As per the official narrative, Mexico’s violence is entirely the fault of drug cartels, period. This rationalisation conveniently excises from the equation the Mexican state’s established track record of killing and disappearing – not to mention the lengthy history of collaboration between Mexican police and military personnel and cartel operatives.

The Jalisco New Generation Cartel, alleged steward of the secret crematorium, was one of various groups recently designated as Foreign Terrorist Organizations by the administration of US President Donald Trump, which has also been making noises about potential US military raids on Mexico to combat the cartels.

Such action by the US would take the old “war on drugs” to a whole new level – and as usual, Mexican civilians would be the ones to pay the price.

In the meantime, Mexicans continue to disappear at a mindboggling rate, the country converted into a mass grave in its own right. In response to a longstanding government policy of not lifting a finger on behalf of missing people and their families, volunteer organisations have been forced to take matters into their own hands – and have often faced state wrath for doing so.

For example, former Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) – who last year handed the national reigns off to his ally Claudia Sheinbaum – once took it upon himself to accuse Mexicans involved in the search for the missing of a “delirium of necrophilia”. According to Mexico’s National Register of Missing and Disappeared Persons, a record 10,064 people disappeared during a single year of AMLO’s term – between May 2022 and May 2023 – which averaged out to 27.6 per day, or more than one person per hour.

And while Sheinbaum has been more vocally sympathetic than her predecessor to the plight of families of the disappeared, particularly in the aftermath of the shocking news out of Jalisco, a bit of sympathy here and there ultimately does nothing to disappear the panorama of institutionalised impunity. Amnesty International now cites 30 disappearances per day in Mexico. Less than a week after the Jalisco discovery, cremation ovens and human remains were found in the northern Mexican state of Tamaulipas. And this, unfortunately, is just the tip of the iceberg.

Certain cases of mass enforced disappearance in Mexico have garnered international attention, namely the September 2014 disappearance of 43 students enrolled at a teacher-training college in the town of Ayotzinapa in Guerrero state. After promising justice, AMLO worked to obstruct the investigation into the episode, which was carried out with the full complicity of Mexican military and police forces operating in cahoots with organised crime. Eleven years later, prospects for meaningful justice have all but disappeared.

I currently reside part-time in the coastal village of Zipolite in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, where on March 1 reports began to circulate that various young visitors from the state of Tlaxcala had been disappeared from the village the previous day. One desperate mother took to social media to plead for assistance in locating her 23-year-old daughter, Jacqueline Meza, a mother of two young children, who had allegedly been abducted along with her boyfriend by a group of men.

When nine bodies were subsequently found in and around an abandoned vehicle hours away from Zipolite on the border between the states of Oaxaca and Puebla, one was identified as belonging to Meza. Several local officials have now been detained in connection with the massacre. A March 10 article in the El País newspaper detailed the current “horror on the coast of Oaxaca”, where a total of 16 people had been disappeared from the area in just two months.

Among residents here in Zipolite – where police officers can regularly be seen in amiable conversation, in full public view, with the dons of the local underworld – the prevailing version of events appears to be that Meza and the others were in fact delinquents who had come to Oaxaca for the purpose of robbing establishments along the coast. They were “up to no good”, so the gossip goes, and were therefore targeted by the neighbourhood narcos, who make a point of maintaining a monopoly on crime in the area and punishing outsiders who don’t play by the rules. In this version, the detained officials were simply bowing to narco orders.

As a de facto justification for enforced disappearance and killing, the “up to no good” reasoning is supremely troubling. And yet it’s also a logical defence mechanism, perhaps, in a country where disappearance has become a way of life.

In other words, telling oneself that only folks who step on the toes of organised crime are eligible for the fate that befell Jacqueline Meza and company may create an illusion of personal safety. In the end, though, that illusion can be deadly.

Over the past months, I have travelled to several Mexican cities, including the capital of Mexico City as well as Culiacan in the state of Sinaloa – home of the eponymous cartel – and Ciudad Juarez in the state of Chihuahua, which lies across the border from El Paso, Texas. In each place, I have seen poster after poster featuring the faces of Mexico’s disappeared – displayed in plazas, plastered onto electrical poles, hung from trees in front of churches.

During a recent visit to the Oaxacan capital of Oaxaca City, I saw a poster reporting the disappearance of a 90-year-old woman.

The majority of the disappeared date from 2006 to the present, although some hail from an earlier era of US-endorsed state oppression – the good old Cold War days of wanton human rights abuses throughout Latin America, all in the name of fighting communism.

The traumatic societal effects of mass enforced disappearance cannot be understated, as countless families of missing people are condemned to what amounts to indefinite emotional torture, unable to grieve their loved ones without knowing what happened to them or where their bodies are.

But as Mexico’s invisible war rages on, disappearance may have already become normalised.

Before his vice president, JD Vance, will visit the semi-autonomous Danish territory, US President Donald Trump reiterated his plans to purchase Greenland.

For international security and safety, we need Greenland. It is required. Trump stated in a Wednesday interview that “we must have it.”

He added, “We need Greenland, you know, at the White House.” And we need Greenland, including Denmark, according to the statement, adding that the US will “as far as we can go.”

Greenland, where calls for full independence from Denmark have long been voiced out, was angered by his comments. 85 percent of the population of the Arctic region has now voiced opposition to resuming its rule.

Other people have noted Trump’s ambitions.

Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, responded to Trump’s tweets on Thursday, saying that his apprehension about Greenland is unsurprising and historical.

In the wake of the world’s desperate search for the resources, Putin explained that the US has long desired the mineral-rich Arctic region.

The Arctic scramble and why Greenland is significant are covered in more detail here.

Is Russia concerned about US control of Greenland?

Putin stated at the International Arctic Forum that he believes Trump is serious about acquiring Greenland and that US efforts will continue to do so in Murmansk, Russia’s largest city within the Arctic circle.

It may appear surprising at first glance, and it would be wrong to assume that the current US administration is making some sort of extravagant statements, Putin said, adding that it is obvious that the US will continue to pursue its “geostrategic, military-political, and economic interests in the Arctic.”

Putin also expressed concern about the transatlantic military alliance between North America and Europe, which includes Russia’s neighbors, Finland and Sweden. Sweden joined NATO in 2024, and Finland joined in 2023.

Russia has never threatened the Arctic, but “we will closely monitor the developments and formulate a plan to combat it by strengthening our military might and modernizing our military base,” Putin said.

Russia’s willingness to cooperate with foreign partners in the Arctic, he added, was “open.”

The more significant the outcomes will be and the more opportunities there are for us to launch international projects in the Arctic with Western nations and friendly nations if they show an interest in joint work.

The US Vice President is in Greenland for what reason?

On Friday, US Vice President JD Vance and his wife Usha Vance will make their first appearance in Greenland.

According to a statement from Vance’s office, they will travel to the US’s Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland with US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright and White House National Security Advisor Mike Waltz to get a briefing on Arctic security issues and meet with US service members.

Mute Egede, the acting head of government in Greenland, stated in an online post on Monday that the country had not actually invited anyone to come in for an official or private visit.

The post read, “We have kindly requested all countries to respect this process, and the current government is a caretaker government awaiting the formation of a new government coalition.”

The Vances changed their travel plan after this. The couple will only travel to the US base while Usha Vance was originally scheduled to attend Sisimiut’s Avannaata Qimussersu dogsled race.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen expressed his approval of this change of course when he stated to Danish radio DR: “I actually think it’s very positive that the Americans are cancelling their visit to Greenlandic society. We are not opposed to them going to their own base in Pituffik, which they will visit.

However, both Denmark and Greenland have expressed concern about Trump’s comments made before his vice president’s trip.

Danish broadcasters were able to hear Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s statement on Tuesday: “I have to say that the pressure being put on Greenland and Denmark in this situation is unacceptable. And we will resist it because of it.

President Trump has a serious attitude. He desires Greenland. Therefore, [this visit] cannot be seen separately from anything else.

Why does the US value Greenland so highly?

Trump has stated at least once that he wants to acquire Greenland, saying that it is essential to US national security, since his inauguration on January 20.

Between the Arctic Ocean and the North Atlantic Ocean, Denmark has a semi-autonomous territory called Greenland. Former Danish colony occupies the island.

Its capital Nuuk is located 3, 500 kilometers (2, 174 miles) east of Copenhagen, which is located 3, 500 kilometers (2, 174 miles) away from New York (some 2, 900 kilometers or 1, 800 miles).

The US considers its strategic importance because of its location, which provides the shortest route between North America and Europe. Washington would gain access to both its military and ballistic missile early warning system.

The US is interested in installing radars in the waters that connect Greenland, Iceland, and the United Kingdom. The US wants to track Russian and Chinese ships because these waters serve as their entry point.

Additionally, Greenland is a rich producer of rare earth minerals, which are used to create technology. According to a 2023 survey, Greenland contains 25 of the 34 minerals that the European Commission deemed to be “critical raw materials.”

Indigenous Inuit people who oppose the extraction of oil and gas make up the majority of Greenland’s population, 56, 000 people.

The US has long expressed interest in Greenland, but Trump is not the first US leader to do so.

After the US purchased Alaska from Russia, US Secretary of State William H. Seward attempted to negotiate with Russia to purchase Greenland in 1867. The attempt, however, failed. US President Harry S. Truman proposed buying the island in 1946, an offer that Denmark rejected when the island was still a Danish colony.

Is the Arctic in a compulsion to control it?

The Arctic’s vast untapped resources are becoming more accessible as the planet warms as a result of climate change. These resources are now being sought after by nations like the US, Canada, China, and Russia.

Canada made a policy statement outlining its plans to increase its military and diplomatic presence in the Arctic in December 2024. In the area, Russia is also building power plants and military installations.

In response to Western sanctions, Russia and China have been collaborating to develop Arctic shipping routes as Beijing searches for alternatives to its traditional shipping route and reduces its dependence on the Strait of Malacca.

Due to melting ice, the Northern Sea Route (NSR), a maritime route in the Arctic Ocean, is becoming more accessible. Shipping trips can be significantly shorter with the NSR. Due to sanctions from the West, Russia wants to increase trade with Asia and Europe through the NSR. The NSR saw a quarter-fold increase in oil shipments from Russia to China last year.

Images of undocumented Indians being shackled in chains on a military deportation flight from the United States flooded India’s airwaves in February. The shocking images revealed the devastating effects that President Donald Trump’s draconian crackdown on “illegal immigration” would have had on thousands of vulnerable Indian citizens who had fought in vain to enter the country.

During a demonstration outside the New Delhi parliament, opposition lawmakers wore handcuffs, including Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the Indian National Congress. They demanded that the Indian prime minister discuss this with the US president ahead of Narendra Modi’s White House visit.

However, Modi responded to questions about the deportations by stating that his government, which was led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), was “fully prepared to bring back illegal immigrants.” He continued, “India’s young, afflicted, and poor people are tricked into immigration.” These kids come from very ordinary families, drawn to big dreams and big promises. Many are brought in by a human-trafficking system without understanding their purpose.

The leader of a Hindu nationalist regime known for its muscular jingoism found this response unusually meek and endearing. With ongoing negotiations regarding reciprocal tariffs, it seems as though Modi was merely trying to avoid a Volodymyr Zelenskyy-style bust-up with Trump. Although this may be true, it is also crucial to keep in mind that both Trump and Modi are on the same page regarding immigration.

Modi rely on lofty ideas and claims about the country, just like his American counterpart. The BJP government’s bombastic assertions about India’s economic health are among them.

The Indian economy is currently experiencing a troubling slowdown, but inequality is a more persistent issue that needs to be addressed. The top 1% of the nation’s most populous nation account for 40.1% of the wealth. India was the third-largest country in the world by the end of 2024, behind only China and the US. It also contributed to a whopping 70% of the global rise in extreme poverty. India has the highest population (234 million people) who live in extreme poverty.

This ominous reality manifests itself in the US as undocumented Indian migrants. Their exact numbers are subject to variations. At the end of 2022, according to estimates from the Pew Research Center, there were 700,000 undocumented Indian immigrants in the US, making Indians the third-largest undocumented population group after Mexicans and Salvadoris. According to the Department of Homeland Security, India has 220 000 undocumented immigrants.

This group of undocumented people, regardless of the population’s exact size, disproves the rosy image of a Hindu nationalist-dominated economic powerhouse. This is why Modi is so eager to end this “illegal immigration” saga as quickly as possible. He opposes any conflict with Trump over how the undocumented migrants are treated, which would highlight the flaws in the Indian nation’s rising image.

However, it is not unusual to hear a Trump-like anti-immigration discourse in a Hindu nationalist India. The Indian right has been routinely bringing up the issue of a rumored scourge of undocumented migration, especially from Bangladesh, for a while.

Kiren Rijiju, the then-Minister of State for Home Affairs, claimed there were “20 million illegal immigrants from Bangladesh in India” in 2016. Amit Shah, the home minister, reported that the nation had more than 40 million illegal immigrants in 2018. Right-wing politicians added that there are now close to 50 million undocumented immigrants in India in 2023.

These figures lack any actual proof to support them.

These assertions about the existence of a secretive, Muslim undocumented population, however, have a powerful impact on Hindu nationalists in India and fit well with an Islamophobic discourse about a Hindu nation facing an existential threat from its neighbors.

Right-wing politicians in India can lay blame on the undocumented “outsider” for the economic plight of the country’s economically underprivileged by making unsupported claims about the threat of “illegal immigration” from Bangladesh. According to Shah, “They]Bangladeshi immigrants are eating the grain that belongs to the poor.” In another instance, Shah has referred to undocumented immigrants as “termites” and “infiltrators” who needed to be relocated. Shah also promised that the BJP government would “pick up infiltrators one by one and throw them into the Bay of Bengal” while campaigning in 2019.

These unsupported assertions also stoke Hindu nationalists’ concern that a Hindu nation will face a demographic challenge. For instance, Ashwini Upadhyay, the leader of the BJP’s Delhi division, claimed that the Hindu population’s majority status was in danger during a TV interview.

He claimed that “illegals,” “Muslim] Rohingyas,” and “[Muslim] coverts” were diluting India’s status as a “Hindu nation.”

Vice President Jagdeep Dhankhar also claimed that “illegal immigration” was eroding “demographics” in similar vein. He noted that this cohort was undermining democracy by gaining “electoral relevance,” undermining the country’s health and education sectors, and denying citizens’ employment opportunities. He also warned that these “demographic invasions” would harm the Hindu ethnic identity if left unchecked.

Finally, it’s a common adage in India that “illegal migration” is synonymous with crime. Minister of External Affairs S. Jaishankar stated in a statement to the lower house of the Indian parliament that “illegal mobility and migration have many other related activities that are also of an illegal nature.” Authorities in India have also claimed that there is a “well-oiled” criminal network that assists undocumented migrants gain residency, employment, fake birth certificates, and eventually voting rights, while Jaishankar here was referring to undocumented Indian migrants in the US. This has resulted in police searches and deportations aimed at Bangladeshis and Rohingya in a manner similar to Trump’s.

Bengali-speaking Muslims from India are frequently the target of these raids. A study conducted a few years ago discovered that more Bangladeshis were emigrating than entering. None of this is relevant in the era of the rise of the right, though. It’s always the shady outsider who is to blame for problems in the nation, whether it’s Trump’s US or Modi’s India.

This mindset fuels the anti-immigration wave in both India and the US. In India, it provided the justification for laws banning Muslims from obtaining Indian citizenship, such as the 2019 Citizenship Amendment Act.

Modi won’t run the risk of hurting his relationship with Trump by supporting the rights of undocumented Indians in the US. His views on immigration are the same as Trump’s, and he only harbors contempt for undocumented people, even if they are Indian citizens.

Nigeria: Horseback parades and spirituality

The continent’s largest Muslim population is located in Nigeria, the country with the highest population in Africa.

A number of ethnic groups, notably the Hausas and Fulanis, live in the predominantly Muslim northern regions. In the wake of conflict involving bandits and armed organizations like Boko Haram, the north has become synonymous with instability and violence for the past ten years.

The area is a hub for vibrant cultural practices, though for those who reside there.

The north’s hustle and bustle slow down during Ramadan as most people stay indoors to avoid the heat and concentrate on spiritual pursuits like reading the Quran or attending lectures.

And every year, the Durbar festival is held to mark Eid.

Hausas have been affluent with Durbars for centuries because of their cultural, religious, and equestrian celebrations. The Kano City Durbar, one of the largest events ever held today, sees hundreds of thousands of people dressed up in chic Eid attire escorting to the emir’s palace on horseback.

Muhammad Sani Sabo, a photographer based in Kano, has been keeping track of Durbars since 2014. He also takes pictures of his city’s everyday activities. The 31-year-old says he hopes to depict the north in a more accurate way, making it more than just a poster boy for war, illiteracy, and poverty.

According to Sabo, “there are more stories to tell about the north.” “I am a master of telling all the stories, and I think I can do it better than anyone from Lagos or abroad.”

Women and girls in Kano, Kano, will gather for the 2023 Ramadan celebration. The city hosts lectures and gatherings led by an imam or spiritual guide during the holy month of Islam. The city has a lot of Quran study. Companies or individuals occasionally share gifts or food to highlight the spirit of giving and sharing.

Ado Bayero, the 15th emir of Kano, rides a horse during the Durbar festival in 2024. Hausas are renowned for their excellent horsemanship and warrior prowess. Ancient military parades that proclaimed war readiness were the inspiration of Durbar culture. The Ramadan conclusion is celebrated while the current Durbar festivals highlight that heritage. The emir leads his convoy of warriors, artillerymen, and praise singers as the colorful horseback procession moves forward after the morning prayers.

In April 2024, a Kano family awaits the Durbar procession outside the emir’s palace. Without chic, new traditional attire and, of course, a peek at the emir’s glamorous entourage, Eid, or the Hausa festival, is incomplete.