Vietnam police say they have arrested five people and smashed a money laundering ring that brought $1. 2bn of criminal cash into the country from abroad.
Between 2022 and 2024, members of the ring – which included bank employees – forged identification cards and bank seals to establish 187 businesses, opening more than 600 corporate bank accounts, according to authorities.
The accounts were used to transfer and legalise money obtained through fraud or gambling abroad, police said in a statement on Wednesday, adding that total transactions amounted to about $1. 2bn.
The arrests – including one bank employee – were made in Da Nang, where police said it was the biggest money laundering case ever exposed in the central coastal city.
Police have seized 122 fake seals and original copies of 40 business registration certificates.
In October, Vietnamese property tycoon Truong My Lan was jailed for life on money laundering charges, although she is appealing the verdict.
The property developer had already been handed the death penalty for fraud totalling $27bn in a separate case.
A rapidly growing wildfire broke out north of Los Angeles, while two major fires burning in the metropolitan area for more than two weeks were getting under control, fire officials said.
Ferocious flames devoured hillsides near Castaic Lake on Wednesday, spreading rapidly to cover more than 9,400 acres (3,800 hectares) in just a few hours.
Evacuations were ordered for 31,000 people around the lake, which sits 56km (35 miles) north of Los Angeles, and close to the city of Santa Clarita.
The United States Forest Service said the entire 700,000-acre (2,800sq-km) park in the San Gabriel Mountains was closed to visitors.
As the new fire raged, the two deadly fires that have ravaged Los Angeles came under greater control, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) said.
Since the two fires broke out on January 7, they have burned an area nearly the size of Washington, DC, killed 28 people and damaged or destroyed nearly 16,000 structures, Cal Fire said.
Private forecaster AccuWeather projects damage and economic losses at more than $250bn.
The UN climate change body will receive funding from the foundation of billionaire Michael Bloomberg after President Donald Trump declared the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement for the second time.
In an announcement on Thursday, Bloomberg said the intervention aims to ensure the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) remains fully funded despite the US halting its contributions.
“From 2017 to 2020, during a period of federal inaction, cities, states, businesses, and the public rose to the challenge to uphold our nation’s commitments – and now, we are ready to do it again,” Bloomberg, who serves as the UN Special Envoy on Climate Ambition and Solutions, said in a statement.
The US typically provides 22 percent of the UNFCCC secretariat’s budget, with the body’s operating costs for 2024-2025 projected at an estimated $96. 5m.
After taking oath on Monday, Trump signed one of his first executive orders withdrawing the US from the climate deal and ending all of the country’s international climate financial commitments.
Simon Stiell, the UNFCCC’s executive secretary, framed Trump’s decision as a lost opportunity for US clean energy business, saying it only sends “all the vast wealth to competitor economies” while making climate-related disasters worse.
European Commissioner for Climate Wopke Hoekstra described Trump’s withdrawal as “a truly unfortunate development” for the US and the rest of the world.
Bloomberg’s decision to step in marks the second time he did so to fill the gap left by US federal disengagement.
In 2017, following the Trump administration’s first withdrawal from the Paris accord, Bloomberg pledged up to $15m to support the UNFCCC.
He also launched “America’s Pledge”, an initiative to track and report US non-federal climate commitments, ensuring the world could monitor US progress as if it were still a fully committed party to the Paris Agreement.
Real Madrid are the first football club to top a billion euros in revenue during a single season, fuelled by income generated by the revamped Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, according to accountancy firm Deloitte.
The order of the clubs at the top of Deloitte’s annual Football Money League stayed the same, with Madrid at 1. 05 billion euros ($1. 09bn) followed by Premier League champions Manchester City ($872m) and Paris Saint-Germain ($839m).
The $216m gap between first and second is the biggest Deloitte has ever recorded.
The dramatic refurbishment of the home of Real Madrid doubled matchday revenues to $258m in the 2023-24 campaign.
Madrid have taken out loans totalling more than $1bn since 2018 to renovate the Bernabeu, with the aim of turning it into a major source of revenue.
The state-of-the-art venue now boasts an undulating metal roof, shops, expanded VIP areas and a retractable pitch.
Real Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeu Stadium was reopened in December 2023 after a major renovation project [File: Angel Martinez/Getty Images]
Pop megastar Taylor Swift is among the big names who have performed at the stadium since it reopened, while the NFL’s first game in Spain will take place there later this year.
However, Madrid’s aim of using the Bernabeu, which has a capacity of about 80,000, to generate extra cash has been hit by complaints over noise pollution from residents, with the club temporarily suspending the hosting of concerts.
“Club stadia are increasingly being valued as more than just matchday assets, with a number of clubs converting their grounds into multiuse entertainment venues that attract new visitors, sponsors, and retail opportunities. ” said Tim Bridge, lead partner in the Deloitte Sports Business Group.
“Football clubs are now realising the value of becoming far more than sporting brands, with media and entertainment becoming intertwined with the commercial potential that they have to offer. ”
Despite an 11 percent rise in matchday revenue, commercial remained the biggest revenue source for the 20 Money League clubs for the second year running, accounting for 44 percent of total revenue.
Broadcast revenue was stable at 4. 4 billion euros ($4. 6bn) as each of the “Big Five” leagues – England, Spain, Italy, France and Germany – remained in the same domestic broadcast cycle as the preceding season.
English clubs continue to dominate, fuelled by the Premier League’s television revenues, with six of the top 10 and nine among the 20 Money League clubs.
Manchester United rose to fourth on the back of a return to the Champions League ($802m), ahead of Bayern Munich ($796m).
Barcelona slipped to sixth as renovation work on their Camp Nou stadium has forced the Catalan giants to switch to the smaller Montjuic, which hosted the 1992 Olympics.
Arsenal, Liverpool, Tottenham and Chelsea complete the top 10 even though the latter three clubs missed out on the Champions League last season.
Barcelona remain top of the list of women’s sides for a third straight year with $18. 6m in revenue, a 26 percent increase from the 2022-23 season.
As US President Donald Trump launched a 100-day effort to end the war in Ukraine, Kyiv’s long-range weapons were devastating the heart of Russia’s war effort – its oil depots, weapons storages and factories.
Trump took the oath of office on Monday, saying success would be measured “not just by the battles that we win, but also by the wars that we end and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into”.
That was a reference to his oft-stated belief that the administration of his predecessor, former US President Joe Biden, erred in allowing the Ukraine war to begin, and his vow to end it quickly.
Trump’s special envoy, retired US General Keith Kellog, has set himself a 100-day challenge to achieve a ceasefire.
(Al Jazeera)
Russian President Vladimir Putin held an unprecedented National Security Council meeting on Trump’s inauguration day, repeating his willingness to enter negotiations. He said a solution should remove the root causes of the war – a reference to NATO’s eastward expansion.
Sergei Ryabkov, Russian deputy foreign minister, said on Wednesday that the Trump administration presented an opportunity for agreement.
“Compared to the pessimism under the previous US president, today, there is a small chance of opportunities,” he said at an academic event in Moscow.
As these developments of high politics unfolded, Ukraine was smashing through Russian aerial defences and burning some of the enemy’s ability to wage war.
That campaign of strategic interdiction was visibly weakening the Russian war effort, said Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskii.
“Over several months now, the normal consumption of artillery ammunition by the Russian army has actually been halved,” he told TSN, a Ukrainian television network.
“If earlier this figure reached 40,000 per day, now it is much lower.
“These strikes reduce the ability of Russian troops to maintain a high intensity of combat operations,” he added.
During the past week, Ukraine scored several hits.
(Al Jazeera)
Ukraine’s General Staff said three of their drones hit the Liskinskaya oil depot in the Russian region of Voronezh, engulfing it in flames on January 16.
“This oil depot provides fuel to the Russian military,” they said.
Geolocated footage showed the refinery burning that day.
Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation, said drones also struck the Tambov Gunpowder Plant in Kuzmino-Gat. The plant produces gunpowder and nitrocellulose for use in rocket systems, artillery shells and other systems, he said.
On Saturday, Ukraine’s General Staff said Kyiv’s drones struck a petroleum products storage facility in Russia’s Tula region, setting it alight.
The facility supplied Russia’s armed forces, the staff said. Ukrainian drones also struck a Rosneft oil depot in the Kaluga region that supplied the military.
On the same day, saboteurs set fire to a locomotive in St Petersburg, destroying it, said Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Service (GUR). The engine was used to ferry war material, the GUR said.
Ukraine has been deploying foot soldiers in its behind-enemy-lines campaign to destroy Russian equipment.
A resident stands near an apartment building damaged by Russian military attacks in the Donetsk town of Pokrovsk [Inna Varenytsia/Reuters]
On Trump’s inauguration day, Kovalenko said, Ukrainian drones struck the Gorbunov Aircraft Plant in Kazan.
It is a subsidiary of the Tupolev United Aircraft Corporation, which produces and repairs Tu-160 strategic bombers, said the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank.
Geolocated footage showed direct hits to fuel tanks at the factory.
On Tuesday, Ukraine’s General Staff said their drones struck the Liskinskaya refinery for the second time in a week.
“Tanks with fuel and lubricants, which the occupiers provide to the Russian troops, are burning,” they said.
They also struck the Smolensk Aviation Plant, “where combat aircraft are also being modernised and produced”, the staff said.
Geolocated footage showed fires at the plant.
Kovalenko said the plant builds Sukhoi Su-25 bombers, which are used to drop glide bombs on Ukrainian front lines.
The war on the ground
Russia continued to assault Ukrainian defences during the past week, and on Friday succeeded after a year-long effort in capturing the village of Vremivka, on the Donetsk-Zaporizhia border in eastern Ukraine.
Vremivka lies adjacent to Velyka Novosilka, which Ukraine recaptured in a counteroffensive in 2023.
Russia has been keen to recover the position because it offers a vantage point from which to disrupt Ukrainian lines of supply and communication in Donetsk.
A Ukrainian officer said the Russians had a three-to-one numerical advantage in the area, demonstrating Russian priorities.
Russia also appeared to be preparing a major new push to capture Pokrovsk, in Donetsk.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said that Ukraine’s push into Kursk has diverted 60,000 of Russia’s most capable personnel from the Ukrainian front to defend Russian turf.
But now, Russia has been amassing units south of Pokrovsk, said Konstantin Mashovets, a retired Ukrainian colonel and military analyst, consolidating elements of four different brigades and three regiments.
The gluing together of disparate units could indicate Russia was making superlative efforts to generate these forces.
“Now south of Pokrovsk there is a rather peculiar strike group of the enemy, which is a kind of mixture of units and formations of two armies at once,” said Mashovets.
“Thanks to all these measures, by concentrating its combat-ready units and formations on a fairly narrow section of the front line, the enemy has received and now has a significant superiority in forces. ”
(Al Jazeera)
Major Victor Tregubov, a spokesman for the Khortytsia unit defending Pokrovsk, said Russian forces were trying to do an end run around the city because they lacked the manpower to tackle it head-on.
“To do this, they need to go west of the city, which they are currently trying to do,” Tregubov told a television channel.
Syrskii told a webcast that the best Russian units were concentrated in Pokrovsk, signalling that this was the top Russian priority.
He also revised upwardly earlier estimates of Russian casualties last year, saying 434,000 of Moscow’s troops had been killed or wounded in 2024, with an estimated 150,000 killed.
