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NDTV
30-05-2025
- Politics
- NDTV
'To Kill A Tyrant': Zelensky's Pick At Book Fair Raises Eyebrows
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife browsed the stalls at a literary fair in Kyiv on Friday and left with some new reading material - a book entitled "To Kill A Tyrant." Zelensky, who has led his country throughout the three-year war with Russia, has repeatedly described Russian President Vladimir Putin as a dictator. He did not reveal if he intended, with his book purchase, to send a message to his Kremlin counterpart. #Watch | Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his wife, First Lady Olena, picked up some new reading material while browsing the Book Arsenal - a literary fair in Kyiv. One of the books purchased by the head of state was 'To Kill a Tyrant'. Zelensky, who has led his… — NDTV WORLD (@NDTVWORLD) May 30, 2025 He picked up the book, by Italian academic Aldo Andrea Cassi, in the Ukrainian-language version, according to a post about his visit to the book fair on his account on the social media platform Telegram. A photo he posted showed Zelenskiy's wife, Olena, thumbing through a copy of the book as her husband stood next to her. Zelenskiy said it was one of several titles he and his wife had picked up at the fair. The full title of the book is: "To Kill A Tyrant; A History Of Tyrannicide From Caesar To Gaddafi." It was published in Italian in 2022, and according to a summary released by the publisher of the Italian edition, it poses the question: "Is it right or wrong to kill a tyrant? And if it is, who decides?"
NDTV
27-05-2025
- Politics
- NDTV
From Student-Teacher Love Story To Face-Shoving Video: Macrons In Spotlight
French President Emmanuel Macron's wife, Brigitte Macron, is back in the spotlight after a video appeared to show her shoving his face away when they touched down for a visit to Vietnam. The video has gone viral on social media, with many users construing it as a "slap". View this post on Instagram A post shared by NDTV WORLD (@ndtvworld) This is not the first time their relationship has made headlines. They first met in 1993 at the Catholic Lycee La Providence in Amiens, where Brigitte, then 39, was a high school teacher and Emmanuel, 15, was her student. Brigette, who was married to banker Andre-Louis Auziere and had three children with him, had her eldest daughter in the same class as Emmanuel. According to a biography of France's first lady, Brigitte Macron: An Unfettered Woman by Maelle Brun, their family discovered their affair in the summer of 1994 after they saw them sunbathing together by the pool. Brigitte and Auziere were later divorced. Emmanuel's ex-sports teacher Daniel Leleu said, "At 15, Macron had the maturity of a 25-year-old. He preferred to spend his time talking with the teachers rather than his classmates." The relationship, though, did not sit well with everyone. Some sent anonymous letters to Brigette's family, which ran an old chocolate and macaron factory. Others went as far as spitting on her door, according to Ms Brun. In her autobiography, Ms Brun wrote, "From one day to the next, her friends, with whom she was planning a vacation, refused to speak to her." Later, Emmanuel left his hometown to complete his final year in politics and international affairs at a university in Paris. During an interview with Paris Match, Brigette revealed she thought their relationship would not last, for he might fall in love with someone his age, according to a report in The NY Post. She said, "My head was in a mess." Despite being in a long-distance relationship, the two stayed in touch and kept seeing each other. The couple then got married in 2007, the same year Brigette's divorce was finalised, in the beach-front town of Le Touquet, where she married her first husband in 1974. "There are times in your life when you need to make vital choices. Of course, we have breakfast together, me and my wrinkles and him with his youth, but it's like that," she told Elle France. In 2014, Emmanuel became the finance minister and his wife quit her job to support him. The couple's relationship was also in turmoil during Emmanuel's presidential campaign. At the time, there were rumours that Emmanuel was secretly in a relationship with the head of Radio France, and that Brigitte was merely a cover for it, according to The NY Post. Emmanuel denied the rumours. In her biography of Brigitte, Ms Brun mentioned that the First Lady of France was deeply hurt by the rumours and was going through a lot of emotional pain in her life. On Monday, though, Macron was quick to dismiss all the rumours, saying, "My wife and I were merely fooling around but the moment was turned into some kind of planetary catastrophe. Everyone just needs to calm down."
NDTV
26-05-2025
- Politics
- NDTV
'Just Joking': Macron Denies Dispute With Wife After Viral Aircraft Video
French President Emmanuel Macron denied Monday having a domestic dispute with his wife Brigitte after a video appeared to show her shoving his face away when they touched down for a visit to Vietnam, blaming disinformation campaigns for trying to put false meaning on the footage. The Elysee had been hoping that the visit to Vietnam would showcase France's reach into the Indo-Pacific, but it has been shadowed by the incident which occurred as the doors of the presidential plane swung open after landing in Hanoi Sunday. Viral video shows France's First Lady grabbing Emmanuel Macron's face as he exits the presidential plane in Hanoi, Vietnam. Read more: #EmmanuelMacron #Viral — NDTV WORLD (@NDTVWORLD) May 26, 2025 This is the third time this month that Macron has been the subject of viral video footage at a time when France says it is being targeted by repeated disinformation attacks as Russia steps up attacks on Ukraine. It was falsely claimed Macron took cocaine on a trip to Kyiv alongside British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and images also emerged purporting to show Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dominate the French leader in a handshake. Brigitte sticks out both her hands and gives her husband's face a shove, according to footage shot by the Associated Press news agency. The French president appears startled but quickly recovers and turns to wave through the open door. But with most of her body hidden by the aircraft, it is impossible to see his wife's facial expression or body language. "My wife and I were squabbling, we were rather joking, and I was taken by surprise," he said. Now it's "become a kind of planetary catastrophe, and some are even coming up with theories," Macron told reporters. 'Calm down' Macron testily referred to the other incidents, including the images shot on a train to Kyiv where some accounts falsely claimed he shared cocaine with Merz and Starmer. But the object Macron removed from the table when the media entered was a tissue. Erdogan, meanwhile, was filmed holding the president's finger at a summit. "For three weeks... there are people who have watched videos and think I shared a bag of cocaine, that I had a fight with the Turkish president, and that now I'm having a domestic dispute with my wife," said Macron. "None of these are true," he said. "Everyone needs to calm down," he added. After the incident in Hanoi, the couple proceeded down the staircase for the official welcome by Vietnamese officials, though Brigitte Macron did not take her husband's arm when he offered it. The video circulated rapidly online, promoted particularly by accounts that are habitually hostile to the French leader. Macron's office initially denied the authenticity of the images, before they were confirmed as genuine. A close associate of the president later described the incident as a couple's harmless "squabble". 'Nothing more' Referring to the past incidents, Macron said: "In these three videos I took a tissue, shook someone's hand and just joked with my wife, as we do quite often. Nothing more." "We have loads of accounts, anonymous or not, whose frustrations are going to their heads, including news commentators who said this morning that I have the diplomacy of a beaten man," he added. He emphasised that all three videos were "completely authentic" but the meanings attached to them were not. Vietnam is the first stop on Macron's almost week-long tour of Southeast Asia where he will pitch France as a reliable alternative to the United States and China. He will also visit Indonesia and Singapore. The relationship between Macron, 47, and his 72-year-old wife has long been a subject of fascination at home and abroad. She was a drama teacher and he a pupil when they met at a private school in their hometown of Amiens in northeast France. A mother of three children, Brigitte divorced her husband and began a relationship with Macron while he was in his late teens. A high-profile first lady, she has taken legal action to counter false claims on social media about her gender.
NDTV
26-05-2025
- Politics
- NDTV
"Hand Of Kremlin?" Russian Foreign Ministry Mocks Macron's Aircraft Video
Moscow: Russia's foreign ministry spokeswoman on Monday mocked a video of French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron getting off a plane, which has gone viral on social media overnight. Maria Zakharova wrote on Telegram that Macron had received "a right hook from his wife" as the couple arrived for a visit to Hanoi. But she said Macron's advisers would try to explain away the gesture. "Did the first lady decide to cheer up her husband with a gentle pat on the cheek and miscalculated her strength? Was she handing him a tissue, but missed? Did she want to fix his collar but ended up reaching the beloved face?" she said. "Here's a hint: maybe it was the 'hand of the Kremlin'?" she added. The video appears to show Macron moving his face away from his wife's hand, which could be interpreted as part of an argument between the two. Viral video shows France's First Lady grabbing Emmanuel Macron's face as he exits the presidential plane in Hanoi, Vietnam. Read more: #EmmanuelMacron #Viral — NDTV WORLD (@NDTVWORLD) May 26, 2025 Macron denied any "domestic dispute" with his wife, saying that they were "joking as we often do" and noting that other videos had been misinterpreted, such as supposedly showing him sharing a bag of cocaine or confronting the Turkish president. "None of these are true" and "everyone needs to calm down", he said. The footage has been replayed multiple times on Russian state TV and has been circulating online on accounts hostile to the French president. Zakharova, along with the American conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, had earlier wrongly accused Macron and his German and British counterparts of using drugs on a train from Ukraine, after mistaking a crumpled tissue for a bag of cocaine based on a low-definition video. Even though the claims were later debunked, they still prompted a high-level reaction from the Elysee Palace and the French foreign ministry.
NDTV
15-05-2025
- Politics
- NDTV
Watch: Syrians Celebrate After Trump Announces Lifting Of US Sanctions
Damascus: US President Donald Trump's announcement from Saudi Arabia about the United States easing wide-ranging sanctions on Syria sparked festivities in the capital, Damascus, as Syrians hoped for relief after years of impoverishment by civil war and restrictions. Syrian interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa welcomed Trump's "courageous" move and said now his government can "begin the real work, with which modern Syria will be reborn." Speaking in a television address, al-Sharaa said the American Presidnet's decision "was a historic and courageous decision, which alleviates the suffering of the people, contributes to their rebirth and lays the foundations for stability in the region". The sanctions were widely seen as a major obstacle to Syria's economic recovery and post-war reconstruction, and their lifting can bring much-needed investment to the country emerging from decades of autocratic rule by the Assad family, as well as the war, which left an estimated 90 per cent of its population in poverty. After the announcement, videos from Damascus emerged on social media, showing hundreds of men, women, and children gathered at Umayyad Square, with music blasting in the background. While some people were seen dancing and waving Syrian flags, others drove by in their cars, with an anticipation of a better life palpable in their celebrations. #Watch | Syrians Celebrate After Trump Announces Lifting Of US Sanctions Read more: — NDTV WORLD (@NDTVWORLD) May 15, 2025 "Now, we are not going to have any excuse by the government that there are sanctions that prevent doing this or that," Jihad Yazigi, founder and editor of the Syria Report, told the Washington Post. Hazem al-Loda, 31, a taxi driver who worked long hours to put food on the table, said that though US sanctions were meant to target the Assad regime, it was people who suffered the most. "The government didn't suffer. The rich found ways around it. We saw their fancy cars driving the streets in front of us, while we couldn't afford anything made after 2011," he told the Post. Sanctions On Syria And Trump's Announcement The US has imposed three sanctions programs on Syria. In 1979, the country was designated a "state sponsor of terrorism" because its military was sound of being involved in neighbouring Lebanon's civil war and had backed armed groups there. In 2003, then-President George W Bush signed the Syria Accountability Act into law, which focused heavily on Syria's support of designated terror groups, its military presence in Lebanon, its alleged development of weapons of mass destruction, as well as oil smuggling and the backing of armed groups in Iraq after the US-led invasion. In 2019, during Trump's first term, he signed the Caesar Act, sanctioning Syrian troops and others responsible for atrocities committed during the civil war that started in 2011 and left more than half a million dead, displaced millions. Coupled with similar measures by other countries, the sanctions have touched every part of the Syrian economy and everyday life in the country. They have led to shortages of goods from fuel to medicine, and made it difficult for humanitarian agencies responding to receive funding and operate fully. Companies around the world struggle to export to Syria, and Syrians struggle to import goods of any kind because nearly all financial transactions with the country are banned. That has led to a blossoming black market of smuggled goods. During his Riyadh visit this week, Trump offered to lift sanctions on Syria, mostly imposed during the repressive rule of ousted president Bashar al-Assad. The move comes as a major boost to the war-ravaged country, still getting to grips with Sharaa's December toppling of Assad. Trump however gave no indication that the United States would remove Syria from its blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism -- a designation dating back to 1979 over support to Palestinian militants that severely impedes investment. What Lifting Of Sanctions Mean For Syria? After Trump's announcement, Syria's currency gained 60 per cent on Tuesday night - a signal of how transformational the removal of sanctions could be. Still, experts believe it will take time to see any tangible impact on Syria's economy. Per an Associated Press report, removal of all three sanctions could mean banks could return to the international financial system or car repair shops could import spare parts from abroad. If the economy improves and reconstruction projects take off, many Syrian refugees who live in crowded tented encampments relying on aid to survive, could decide to return home. "If the situation stabilised and there were reforms, we would then see Syrians returning to their country if they were given opportunities, as we expect," Lebanese economist Mounis Younes told AP. The easing of sanctions also has an important symbolic weight because it would signal that Syria is no longer a pariah, said President al-Shaar. "Unless enough layers of sanctions are peeled off, you cannot expect the positive impacts on Syria to start to appear," said al-Shaar. "Even if you remove some of the top ones, the impact economically would still be nonexistent."
