Ukraine, Europe Insist Russia Truce Must Precede Any Land Deal
By , Alberto Nardelli, and Daryna Krasnolutska
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Ukraine and its European allies have told the US that a ceasefire and clarity on security guarantees for Kyiv should precede any peace deal with Russia that involves negotiations about territory, according to people familiar with the matter.
Ahead of a meeting in London Wednesday, the officials sought further detail from Washington on the sequencing of its proposal to stop the fighting in Ukraine and to bring an end to Russia's full-scale invasion, currently into its fourth year. It's the latest attempt to influence the talks that had left Europe under pressure as Washington pushes for a deal with Vladimir Putin and tries to exert tough conditions on Kyiv.
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Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
‘They are in shock': Indian students fear Trump has ended their American dream
For weeks, Subash Devatwal's phone has not stopped ringing. Some of the calls have been from distressed students, at other times it is their panicked parents, but all have the same question – is their dream of studying in the US still possible? Devatwal runs an education consultancy in Ahmedabad, the main city in the Indian state of Gujarat. It is one of thousands of such organisations that exist across the country, helping Indian students achieve what many consider to be the ultimate symbol of success: getting into an American university. It has long been a booming business for Devatwal. Families in India will often invest their entire life savings to send their children to study in the US and last year there were more than 330,000 Indians enrolled at American universities, more than any other foreign nationality, overtaking Chinese students in numbers for the first time in years. But this year the situation looks drastically different. As Donald Trump's administration has taken aim at international students – first implementing draconian screening measures over political views and then last week ordering all US embassies globally to indefinitely pause all student visa interviews – many Indian students and their families have been left in limbo. Trump's unilateral decision to block Harvard University from admitting international students, which was later blocked by the courts, also caused widespread panic and stoked fears that foreign students at other universities could get caught in the president's crosshairs. 'The students are in shock. Most of them spend several years preparing to study in the US,' said Devatwal. He said many of his clients were now hesitant to pursue a US degree, given the high levels of turmoil and uncertainty following the Trump administration's new policies. Indian students can expect to pay between $40,000 to $80,000 (£29,500 to £59,000) a year on tuition alone to study in the US. In previous years, Devatwal's organisation sent more than 100 students to American universities but this year he said the number had dropped to about 10. Instead, families were shifting their focus to the UK and other European countries. A recent analysis by the Hindu newspaper estimated a 28% drop in Indian students going to the US in 2025. 'Families contribute their savings, take out loans from banks and borrow from relatives, all in the hope that the student will secure a good job abroad, repay the debt, and build a promising future,' said Devatwal. 'In such uncertain circumstances, parents are understandably reluctant to let their children take such a risky path.' Brijesh Patel, 50, a textile trader in Surat, Gujarat, said he had been saving money for over a decade to make sure his son could go to a US university, including selling his wife's jewellery and borrowing money from relatives. 'Everyone in the family wanted our son to go to the US for his studies and make something good of his life,' said Patel. His 21-year-old son, who he asked not to be named for fear of retribution by the US authorities, had secured a place at two American universities for his master's degree and Patel had already paid 700,000 rupees (£6,000) to consultancies who helped with the applications. But amid the turmoil under Trump, Patel said his son was being advised not to even apply for his student visa, due to the uncertainty and high probability of rejection. 'We simply can't take that risk. If our son goes now and something goes wrong, we won't be able to save that kind of money again,' he said. However, Patel said he was not willing to give up on the family dream just yet. 'I am an optimist, and my son is willing to wait a year,' he said. 'We're hoping that things improve by then. It's not just my son who will be living the American dream, it's all of us: my wife, our relatives and our neighbours. I've struggled my whole life – I don't want my son to face the same struggles here in India.' The fear among prospective and current students was palpable. Several Indian students studying in the US declined to speak to the Guardian, fearing it could jeopardise their visas. In India, a student selected in December to be one of this year's Fulbright-Nehru doctoral fellows – a highly competitive scholarship that pays for the brightest students to study abroad at US universities as part of their PhD thesis – said the applications of their entire cohort had recently been demoted back to 'semi-finalists'. 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He cited one example of a student who had been admitted to New York University for the coming year but was instead planning to go to the London School of Economics after the US visa interviews were paused. Bhartiya said Indian students primarily went to the US to study Stem subjects – science, technology, engineering and maths – and so the focus had shifted to other countries strong in these areas. 'Germany is the main country where students are shifting to for Stem subjects,' he said. 'Other countries like Ireland, France, the Netherlands, which are also gaining substantial interest in the students. At the undergraduate level, the Middle East has also seen a lot of gain in interest given parents feel that it is close by and safer and given the current political environment they may want their kids closer to the home.' Among the Indian students forced to abandon their plans is Nihar Gokhale, 36. He had a fully funded offer for a PhD at a private university in Massachusetts, but recently received a letter saying the funding was being withdrawn, as the university faced issues under the Trump administration. 'It was quite shocking. I spoke to people at the university, and they admitted it was an exceptional situation for them too,' said Gokhale. Without the funding, the US was financially 'out of the question' and he said he had an offer from the UK he now intended to take up. 'For at least the next three or four years, I'm not considering the US at all,' he said. • This article was amended on 4 June 2025 to correct a conversion error. An earlier version said that 700,000 rupees was £68,000 instead of saying £6,000.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Hegseth says Nato allies ‘very close' to raising defence spending target to 5%
The US defence secretary, Pete Hegseth, said Nato allies were 'very close, almost near consensus' to an agreement to significantly raise targets for defence spending to 5% of GDP in the next decade. The Trump administration official indicated he expected the increased target to be agreed at a summit in The Hague later this month – and confirmed that the headline figure was to be split into two parts. 'This alliance, in a matter of weeks, will be committing to 5%: 3.5% in hard military and 1.5% in infrastructure and defence-related activities. That combination constitutes a real commitment,' he said. Hegseth was speaking at a press conference at Nato headquarters in Brussels after the morning session of an all-day meeting of defence ministers from the 32-country transatlantic military alliance. 'I'm very encouraged by what we heard in there,' Hegseth told reporters. 'Countries in there are well exceeding 2% and we think very close, almost near consensus, on a 5% commitment to Nato.' Nato's current target level for military spending, agreed at a summit in Cardiff in 2014, is 2% of GDP, but Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that European allies and Canada do not spend enough compared with the US. In an attempt to avoid Trump wrecking the first Nato summit of his second term, the alliance's new secretary general, Mark Rutte, proposed a 3.5% plus 1.5% target, though there is some ambiguity about the target date. Initial reports suggested that Rutte wanted allies to hit the target from 2032, though earlier this week British sources suggested the date could be 2035. Sweden's defence minister said he would like to see the target hit by 2030. Only Poland currently exceeds the 3.5% target for hard military spending at 4.32%, according to Nato figures, while the US defence budget, the largest in the alliance, amounts to 3.4% of GDP, at $967bn (£711bn). The UK spends 2.33% of GDP on its military, but has pledged to increase that to 2.5% by 2027 and to 3% some time in the next parliament. Earlier this week the prime minister, Keir Starmer, declined to set a firm date for the UK achieving 3% as he unveiled a strategic defence review. Related: Why is defence such a hard sell? The same reason Starmer is struggling in the polls | Martin Kettle Rutte will visit London on Monday to meet Starmer before the summit. Downing Street said the prime minister and the secretary general would 'talk about how we ensure all allies step up their defence spending now in order to respond to the threats that we face now'. Germany's defence minister, Boris Pistorius, said Berlin would need up to 60,000 additional troops to meet new Nato targets for weapons and personnel. 'We are stepping up to our responsibility as Europe's largest economy,' the minister said on Thursday. Germany, which currently spends 2.12% of GDP on defence, had been singled out by Trump as a laggard in spending, though until Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Berlin had been reluctant to be a leader in European military spending, partly due to the memories of the militarism of the second world war.
Yahoo
5 hours ago
- Yahoo
Officers in Minneapolis raid wore distinct patches. One was authorized, another wasn't, feds say.
A patch referencing St. Paul on an ICE agent's uniform was authorized, but that wasn't the case for an ATF agent's patch that people noticed during a federal law enforcement operation in Minneapolis this week, the agencies said Friday. A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer wore a circular patch on the arm of his uniform reading 'St. Paul Field Office Special Response Team.' Each of the 25 ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations Special Response Teams across the U.S. has a unique patch, an ICE spokesperson said Friday. The St. Paul patch is intended to depict an 'ancient Scandinavian warrior and a Vegvisir, or 'wayfinder,' and ties into the regional identifiers for Minnesota including a nod to the Scandinavian heritage of many of the early European settlers in Minnesota,' the spokesperson said in a statement. The imagery raised questions for some people. Brandon Schorsch, who took video of the patch and posted a photo of it on social media, wrote: 'I am deeply concerned about this patch.' The vegvisir has been co-opted by some far right extremist groups, according to a senior research analyst with the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Project, though more information has to be known about a person's intentions to determine the significance of the image in a particular use. The ICE patch 'is in no way an affiliation to an extremist group,' the agency spokesperson said. On Tuesday, a large federal law enforcement presence drew protests in South Minneapolis from people concerned it was an immigration raid. Officials from the FBI, ATF and the Department of Homeland Security gathered with tactical vehicles at the corner of Lake Street and Bloomington Avenue late in the morning. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said it 'was related to a criminal search warrant for drugs and money laundering and was not related to immigration enforcement.' It was one of eight search warrants 'for a transnational criminal organization,' according to Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt. 'Federal investigators conducted a groundbreaking criminal operation today — Minnesota's first under the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF) umbrella — marking a new chapter in how we confront complex, multidimensional threats,' Jamie Holt, ICE Homeland Security Investigations special agent in charge for St. Paul, said in a statement. Derrick Thompson guilty of all charges in Minneapolis high-speed crash that killed 5 young women Minneapolis man sentenced for stabbing, hanging St. Paul woman's dog after argument Stillwater: Lift Bridge rescue call was false alarm, authorities say St. Paul police name detective, officer, employee of the year Verdict awaits after closing arguments in Derrick Thompson's trial for crash that killed 5 Schorsch, of Minneapolis, heard from his wife about armored vehicles and the large amount of law enforcement gathered Tuesday. 'That's going to make people feel frightened,' he said. He went to the area and was recording video when he noticed the ICE agent wearing the patch. He had an audible, 'Ohhh,' reaction on the video when he saw it. 'In my job, I do look out for things like this,' said Schorsch, who works as the combatting hate organizer for Jewish Community Action, though he was not there in his work capacity on Tuesday. The Southern Poverty Law Center says there are Neo-Völkisch groups that 'rely on a romanticized Viking aesthetic and mythos — imagery they use to perpetuate their belief in white racial superiority. This adaptable and covert messaging, anchored by a nationwide network of 'kindreds,' has allowed these groups to grow in recent years.' More people are on the lookout for symbols that may have nefarious meanings, Schorsch said. An ICE agent was seen last week in Martha's Vineyard, Mass., with a tattoo of a Valknot on his arm. The symbol is used in Norse mythology. 'Some white supremacists, particularly racist Odinists, have appropriated the Valknot to use as a racist symbol,' according to the Anti-Defamation League. Schorsch also saw two ATF agents on Tuesday with a small patch on their uniforms that said, 'The Others,' and he photographed one of them. The agent seen in the photo is an ATF special agent assigned to a sheriff's office taskforce, said Ashlee Sherrill, a spokeswoman in the ATF's St. Paul Field Division, in response to a reporter's questions. 'The patch in question is not an authorized part of the ATF uniform and has been addressed internally,' Sherrill said, adding that she couldn't provide further information on personnel matters. It's not clear what the patch was meant to convey. St. Paul police name detective, officer, employee of the year Don't pay for traffic tickets over text: DPS warns of scam messages Who's in charge? CDC's leadership 'crisis' apparent amid new COVID-19 vaccine guidance DOC commissioner asks for patience from Stillwater prison families, dismisses idea of reopening Appleton prison Measles vaccination rates drop after COVID-19 pandemic in counties across the US
