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Army aircraft were reportedly hovering above as the killings took place, showing command control of the operation.
At least 130 civilians belonging to the Fulani ethnic group were killed by Burkina Faso’s army and allied militias near the western town of Solenzo in March, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said.
The killings took place amid a major weeks-long military campaign by special forces that resulted in “widespread civilian deaths and massive displacement” of the Fulani pastoralist community in the region, the rights group said in a report on Monday.
It added that an Al-Qaeda-affiliated group called the Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimin (JNIM) then carried out a series of retaliatory attacks, hitting villages that the armed group perceived as having assisted the military.
Ilaria Allegrozzi, senior Sahel researcher at HRW, said in a statement the “the viral videos of the atrocities by pro-government militias near Solenzo” that cirinitially circulated “told only part of the story”.
“Further research uncovered that Burkina Faso’s military was responsible for these mass killings of Fulani civilians, which were followed by deadly reprisals by an Islamist armed group,” Allegrozzi added.
“The government needs to impartially investigate these deaths and prosecute all those responsible.”
‘Many women and children died’
HRW had reported in March that the government’s involvement was likely due to video evidence online.
At that time, the government strongly denied the allegations, saying in a statement it “condemned the propagation, on social media, of images inducing hate and community violence, and fake information aimed at undermining social cohesion” in the West African country.
Burkina Faso’s government and army did not immediately react to Monday’s report, which alleged that the Burkinabe army “led and participated in the massacre of more than 130, possibly many more, ethnic Fulani civilians by pro-government militias”.
The rights organisation’s report is based on interviews with witnesses to the attacks, militia members, journalists and civil society members.
Witnesses quoted by HRW said hundreds of government troops and drones, as well as a pro-government militia called the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP), were involved in attacks on Solenzo and other towns in the western Boucle du Mouhoun region.
The witnesses said most of the victims in Banwa province were women, children and older people.
Military helicopters and drones surveilled the area, “indicating direct command control of the operation”, HRW said.
A 44-year-old Fulani herder, who lost eight family members, told HRW that thousands of families from more than 20 villages were forced to flee to neighbouring Mali in search of protection.
“However, we couldn’t reach Mali without crossing villages [that were] occupied by the VDPs and the army. The VDPs shot at us like animals, while drones were flying over our heads. Many women and children died because they could not run,” he said.
Military rulers took power in Burkina Faso in 2022, but they have largely failed to provide the stability promised, as more than 60 percent of the country is estimated to be outside government control.
The military has also turned to mass recruitment of civilians who are deployed in poorly trained militia units, leading to worsening tensions between ethnic groups.
Outlawed Kurdish group the PKK, which has waged a 40-year insurgency against Turkey, has announced it is laying down its arms and disbanding.
The move followed a call in February by the group’s jailed leader, Abdullah Ocalan, for the organisation to disband. The group is banned as a terrorist group in Turkey, the EU, UK and US.
The PKK insurgency initially aimed to create an independent homeland for Kurds, who account for about 20% of Turkey’s population. But it has since moved away from its separatist goals, focusing instead on more autonomy and greater Kurdish rights.
More than 40,000 people have been killed during the conflict.
In February, Ocalan, 76, called on his movement to lay down its arms and dissolve itself. The PKK leader has been in solitary confinement in prison on an island in the Sea of Marmara, south-west of Istanbul, since 1999.
Ocalan wrote a letter from prison in February saying “there is no alternative to democracy in the pursuit and realisation of a political system. Democratic consensus is the fundamental way.”
It is unclear what Ocalan and his supporters will get in return for disbanding but there is speculation that he may be paroled.
Kurdish politicians will be hoping for a new political dialogue, and a pathway towards greater Kurdish rights.
Both sides had reasons to do a deal now.
The PKK has been hit hard by the Turkish military in recent years, and regional changes have made it harder for them and their affiliates to operate in Iraq and Syria.
President Erdogan needs the support of pro Kurdish political parties if he is to be able to run again in Turkey’s next presidential election, due in 2028.
The decision to disband was an important step towards a “terror-free Turkey”, and the process would be monitored by state institutions, a spokesperson for President Tayyip Erdogan’s AK Party said, according to Reuters news agency.
Winthrop Rodgers, from the international affairs think tank Chatham House, said it would take “a major democratic transition by Turkey” to accommodate demands from Kurdish political parties.
There has been “some goodwill” from some Turkish leaders in recent months, Rodgers said, which allowed the PKK disbandment to play out.
He added: “But whether that extends to the major changes needed to ensure full Kurdish participation in politics and society is far less clear.
“In a lot of ways, the ball is in Turkey’s court.”
Move follows February call by jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan for group to lay down its arms.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, has announced that it plans to disband and disarm in a move promising an end to decades of conflict with Turkiye.
The move was announced on Monday by the Firat News Agency, a media outlet close to the group. Part of a new peace initiative with Ankara designed to put an end to four decades of violence, the plan to disband comes days after the PKK convened a party congress in northern Iraq.
Following the congress on Friday, the group had said that it had reached “historic” decisions tthat would be shared with the public soon.
Firat reported that a statement by PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan outlining his “perspectives and proposals” were read during the congress.
In February, Ocalan – who has been in jail since 1999 – called on the group to lay down its arms and dissolve itself in a bid to end the conflict, which has claimed tens of thousands of lives since the 1980s.
The outlawed PKK, which is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey and most Western states, announced a ceasefire days later but had set conditions to disband, including the establishment of a legal mechanism for peace talks.
Amid ferocious Israeli attacks on Yemen, ostensibly in response to Houthi attacks on Israel, surprising news from the United States seemed to shake matters briefly.
US President Donald Trump said on Tuesday that a ceasefire had been agreed between his country and the Houthis, claiming the Houthis had bent the knee and this was a victory for the US.
He also praised the Houthis for their bravery and resilience.
This meant the US would no longer be bombing Yemen, and the Houthis would stop firing at ships in the Red Sea in support of the Palestinians in Gaza.
There was no mention of Israel in Trump’s announcement – a sign, to many, of a possible chill between Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Houthis, for their part, made it clear that the deal does not extend to Israel and they would continue their attacks until Israel allowed aid into Gaza, ending the starvation it is imposing on the people there.
Israel left out?
Israel has been launching attacks on Yemen, claiming it wants to deter the Houthis, who took control of Sanaa in 2014 and already fought a years-long war against the internationally recognised Yemeni government.
Israel’s most recent attack, on Sunday, bore an eerie resemblance to how it has operated when bombing the trapped population of Gaza, issuing “warnings” to people in three Yemeni ports in Hodeidah governorate to flee, with less than an hour’s notice.
Whether this escalation is a reaction to the announced US ceasefire remains to be seen, but many analysts have spoken of a widening rift between Netanyahu and Trump.
Netanyahu has reportedly expressed his frustration with Trump’s Middle East policy in private conversations.
He has been publicly against the US administration’s talks with Iran, claiming there is no diplomatic way to resolve differences with Tehran, yet Iran and the US have continued their talks.
He went on to blame Iran for the Houthis’ attacks, claiming Israel’s attacks are a message to the “Houthis’ sponsors”.
Trump, for his part, has seemed unconcerned.
“It’s worth noting Trump didn’t say anything about [Houthi] attacks on Israel, which seem to be continuing amid this escalation,” Nicholas Brumfield, a Yemen analyst, told Al Jazeera.
“In [this] case, it’s a US drawdown because the Houthis haven’t been attacking international shipping,” Brumfield said. “They’ve been attacking Israel. The US has been doing its thing, and the Houthis have been targeting US ships.”
After Israeli attacks on Monday and Tuesday, which killed at least three people and wounded 35 others and damaged Hodeidah Port and Sanaa Airport, the Houthis promised retaliation.
Journalists take pictures of a plane Israel destroyed at Sanaa International Airport on May 7, 2025 [Khaled Abdullah/Reuters]
That kind of statement is typical of the Houthis, who have managed to weather more than a decade of attacks by forces with far superior military capabilities.
Air strikes by the US and United Kingdom on Yemen in early 2024 were unable to stop the Houthis’ attacks on Red Sea traffic.
Years of air strikes by a Saudi-led coalition supporting Yemen’s internationally recognised government taught the Houthis to keep their military infrastructure agile, analysts told Al Jazeera.
A senior US government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Al Jazeera that recent US attacks on the Houthis have pushed leaders underground after the killing of some key military commanders.
However, unlike under US President Joe Biden’s administration, the attacks under Trump have been indiscriminate and have led to more civilian deaths. More than 250 people have been killed by US attacks on Yemen since mid-March, including at least 68 people at a centre housing detained African refugees and migrants in late April.
Experts told Al Jazeera that despite the increased ferocity of those attacks, the Houthis have not been deterred.
“The Houthis aren’t going to stop,” Brumfield said.
Israel still striking
The Houthis have made their stance clear vis-à-vis the agreement with the US and the continuation of attacks on Israel, which has also made clear that it plans to keep attacking.
“The stated aim is to deter [the Houthis] or deplete their military capabilities to the point that the Houthis cannot target Israel any more, but these are both very unrealistic goals,” Hannah Porter, an independent Yemen analyst, told Al Jazeera.
Israel already considers that it has diminished the capabilities of two of its biggest foes, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, over the past 19 months.
But trying something like that on the Houthis would be a vastly different challenge, she said.
“Israel has probably not gathered the amount of intel on the Houthis that they have on Hamas or Hezbollah, so tracking and targeting leaders will be harder,” Porter said.
“More importantly, the geographic area is much larger in northern Yemen, meaning that there are far more potential targets.”
“The terrain is a factor, too,” she added. “Northern Yemen is very mountainous with plenty of places to hide people and weapons.”
For now, Israel and the Houthis seem intent on continuing their exchange of attacks. And the first to suffer will be the people of Yemen.
Israel struck numerous targets in recent days in Yemen, including Sanaa’s airport and the port in Hodeidah, which experts said is likely to exacerbate Yemen’s dire humanitarian situation.
Israel destroyed at least three civilian planes in the attacks.
Smoke rises after an Israeli air strike on Sanaa on May 6, 2025 [Adel al-Khader/Reuters]
Yemen is already suffering one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. More than 18.2 million people require humanitarian assistance and protection services, according to the United Nations.
More than 17.1 million Yemenis suffer acute food shortages, and about five million are on the brink of famine.
While analysts said Israel’s attacks on ports will not be a “knockout blow”, they are among a matrix of factors that leave many Yemenis in an increasingly precarious position.
“The humanitarian situation will just get worse,” Raiman Al-Hamdani, a Yemen researcher with the international development company ARK, told Al Jazeera.
“Destroying the two main ports of northern Yemen, where the majority of the population lives, coupled with the FTO [“foreign terrorist organisation”] designation with cuts to the aid system around the world and the deteriorating economy … is a recipe for [unprecedented] humanitarian disaster.”
“[Israel’s attacks] are a continuation of its strategy. It’s out of spite, targets civil infrastructure and the policy of creating human suffering,” Al-Hamdani said.
Both sides seem unwilling to stop, however.
“I cannot see anything quite good coming out of this unless the war Israel is waging on Gaza comes to some form of truce,” Al-Hamdani said.
Many of Monday’s papers are leading on the government’s new plans to control the levels of migration into the UK. The Guardian says the prime minister is toughening rules in what it calls a “challenge to Reform [UK]”, which inflicted losses on Labour in the recent local elections. It states that adults such as spouses, siblings, parents and grown-up children who accompany foreign workers to the UK will be expected to pass an English language test, while care homes will be prevented from recruiting staff from abroad.
“Migrants must earn right to stay… and improve their English,” headlines the i Paper as it quotes Sir Keir Starmer saying new immigrants have to earn the “privilege, not right” to settle in the UK. The paper analyses this as the government “seeking to seize [the] narrative from surging Reform UK”.
The Times also goes with migrants needing to “earn their right to remain”, with those who pay their taxes on time, work in the public sector or have high-skilled jobs, or volunteer in the community, being “prioritised for residency rights”. Shadow home secretary Chris Philip says it is a “joke” to say the plans will be tough on criminal migrants.
“Migrants must wait ten years to become British”, the Daily Express says under what it calls a “crackdown”. It explains that automatic settlement and citizenship for anyone living in the UK for five years will also end. The paper hears from the Conservatives who accuse the government of “pretending to be tough” on the issue.
The Conservative response is also highlighted by the Daily Mail. It says the Tories have called the plans “laughable” for not including a cap on numbers and the paper adds that critics “immediately questioned” how success would be measured. The prime minister vows that “migration numbers will fall”, the paper adds, as it puts the other side of the political argument.
The Daily Telegraph focuses on another part of the wide-ranging proposals with the headline “Starmer to shut ECHR migrant loophole”. It says the white paper will “tighten legislation” that currently allow courts to grant asylum to what it calls “foreign criminals and illegal migrants” under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
The Sun leads on an exclusive which claims that while Starmer is announcing his crackdown on foreign criminals being granted asylum, Trinidadian rapper Bang Em Smurf – real name Daniel Calliste – is staying at a taxpayer-funded hotel while seeking asylum in the UK. The paper reports that the rapper – who is a “pal” of 50 Cent – has previously been jailed in the US “following a shootout”.
The Financial Times says Chinese companies are “accelerating a purge of foreign components” from their supply chains, and were “increasing efforts to source domestic inputs” to replace them with. This follows the “steep tariffs” slapped on China by the US. An analyst for research provider Rhodium Group says the tariffs increase Beijing’s desire to become self-sufficient – something Chinese President Xi Jinping pushed for in policies called “Made in China 2025”.
“I’ll face Putin to get peace”, reads Metro’s headline on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky agreeing to hold “direct negotiations” with his Russian counterpart. The paper says Zelensky accepted President Vladimir Putin’s peace talks offer after pressure from the US president – and hours after saying there would be no talks without a ceasefire first.
The Daily Mirror claims “weight-loss jabs ‘cut cancer risk'”, according to new research that suggests they could cut the risk by nearly half. One expert says it could “herald a new era of preventative cancer medicine”, the paper reports.
And finally, the Daily Star- keen as ever on a weather-related story – splashes a Photoshopped image of beach-ready seagulls – towel, sunnies and hat in tow – and the sub-headline “27C hotter than Malta”. It says a “two-week heatwave starts” is starting today and that Britain will be warmer than Mediterranean resorts including Malta. “Grab an ice cream!” it adds.
Srinagar, Indian-administered Kashmir — On Saturday morning at Fateh Kadal, a densely packed neighbourhood on the sloping embankment of the Jhelum river in Srinagar, Indian-administered Kashmir’s largest city, 62-year-old Hajira wrapped a cotton scarf with a brown paisley design around her shoulders.
With her face muscles tense and sweat beading across her upper lip, she sat on the cement floor of a government-run grains store.
“Can you make it quick?” she called to the person manning the store.
Hajira comes to the store every month to submit her biometric details, as required by the government to secure the release of her monthly quota of subsidised grains, which her family of four depends on.
But this time was different. The past few days have been unprecedented for residents of Indian-administered Kashmir. Drones hovered overhead, airports were shut down, explosions rang out, people were killed in cross-border fire and the region prepared for the possibility of an all-out war.
“He made me stand in the queue,” she said, flinching from knee pain, referring to the store operator. “But there’s uncertainty around. I just want my share of rice so I can quickly return. A war is coming.”
Then, on Saturday evening, Hajira breathed a sigh of relief. United States President Donald Trump announced that he had succeeded in mediating a ceasefire between India and Pakistan.
“I thank Allah for this,” Hajira said, smiling sheepishly. “Perhaps he understood that I didn’t have the means to endure the financial hardship that a war-like situation would have caused.”
On Sunday morning, Trump went a step further, saying in a post on his Truth Social platform that would try to work with India and Pakistan to resolve their longstanding dispute over Kashmir, a region both countries partly control, but where they each claim the part the other administers.
Political analyst Zafar Choudhary, based in the city of Jammu in southern Indian-administered Kashmir, told Al Jazeera that New Delhi would not be happy about Trump’s statement. India has long argued that Pakistan-sponsored “terrorism” is the primary reason for tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours.
However, “Trump’s offer underlines the fact that Kashmir remains central to India-Pakistan confrontations”, Choudhary said.
And for Kashmiris, the hope stemming from the fragile pause in fighting between India and Pakistan, and Trump’s offer to mediate talks on Kashmir, is tempered by scepticism borne from a decades-long, desperate wait for peace.
A Kashmiri family watches as projectiles fly over the sky in Indian-administered Kashmir, Saturday, May 10, 2025 [Rafiq Maqbool/AP Photo]
‘Never been more frightened’
Hundreds of thousands of Kashmiris stood in the direct line of fire between India and Pakistan in recent days.
As the neighbouring nations launched missiles and drones at each other, communities in Indian-administered Kashmir near the de-facto border with Pakistan also witnessed cross-border shelling on a scale unseen in decades, triggering an exodus of people towards safer locations.
The shadow of conflict has stalked their lives for nearly four decades, since an armed rebellion first erupted against the Indian government in the late 1980s. Then, in 2019, the government scrapped Indian-administered Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status amid a huge security crackdown – thousands of people were imprisoned.
On April 22, a brutal attack by gunmen on tourists at Pahalgam left 26 civilians dead, shattering the normalcy critics had accused India of projecting in the disputed region.
Since then, in addition to a diplomatic tit-for-tat and missile exchanges with Pakistan, the Indian government has intensified its crackdown on Indian-administered Kashmir.
It has demolished the homes of rebels accused of links to the Pahalgam attack, raided other homes across the region and detained approximately 2,800 people, 90 of whom have been booked under the Public Safety Act, a draconian preventive detention law. The police also summoned many journalists and detained at least one for “promoting secessionist ideology”.
By Sunday, while a sense of jubilation swept through the region over the ceasefire, many people were still cautious, doubtful even, about whether the truce brokered by Trump would hold.
Just hours after both countries declared a cessation of hostilities, loud explosions rang out in major urban centres across Indian-administered Kashmir as a swarm of kamikaze drones from Pakistan raced across the airspace.
Many residents raced to the terraces of their apartments and homes to capture videos of the drones being brought down by India’s defence systems, a trail of bright red dots arcing across the night sky before exploding in midair.
As part of the emergency protocols, the authorities turned off the electricity supply. Fearing that the debris from drones would fall on them, residents ran for safety. The surge of drones through the night skies also touched off sirens, triggering a sense of dread.
“I don’t think I have ever been more frightened before,” said Hasnain Shabir, a 24-year-old business graduate from Srinagar. “The streets have been robbed of all their life. If the prelude to war looks like this, I don’t know what war will look like.”
A group of Kashmiri women wait for transportation to leave the area after overnight shelling from Pakistan at Gingal village in the Uri district, Indian-administered Kashmir, Friday, May 9, 2025 [Dar Yasin/AP Photo]
A fragile ceasefire
Hours after the ceasefire was announced on Saturday, India accused Pakistan of violating the truce by shelling border regions. Residents across major towns in Kashmir were on their toes, once again, after drones reappeared in the skies.
One of the worst-affected places in Kashmir these days is Uri, a picturesque town of pear orchards and walnut groves close to India’s contested border with Pakistan.
The village is surrounded by majestic mountains through which the Jhelum river flows. It is the final frontier on the Indian-administered side before the hills pave the way to Pakistan-administered Kashmir.
Parts of Uri saw intense shelling, forcing the residents to leave their homes and look for safety. On May 8, officials told Al Jazeera that a woman, Nargis Bashir, was killed in her car as she and her family tried to flee the border region, like thousands of others, after flying shrapnel tore through the vehicle. Three of her family members were wounded.
Muhammad Naseer Khan, 60, a former army serviceman, was huddling in his room when Pakistani artillery fire hit a nearby military post, with metal shrapnel shards blasting through the walls of his house. “The blast has damaged one side of my home,” Khan said, wearing a traditional blue shirt and a tweed coat.
“I don’t know if this place is even liveable,” he said, his bright blue eyes betraying a sense of fear.
Despite the ceasefire, his two daughters and many others in his family who had left for a relative’s house, away from the disputed border, are sceptical about returning. “My children are refusing to return. They have no guarantee that guns won’t roar again,” he said.
Suleman Sheikh, a 28-year-old resident in Uri, recalled his childhood years when his grandfather would talk about the Bofors artillery gun stationed inside a military garrison in the nearby village of Mohra.
“He told us that the last time this gun had roared was in 1999, when India and Pakistan clashed on the icy peaks of Kargil. It is a conventional belief here that if this gun roared again, things are going to get too bad,” he said.
That’s what happened at 2am on May 8. As the Bofors gun in Mohra prepared to fire ammunition across the mountains into Pakistan, Sheikh felt the ground shaking beneath him. An hour and a half later, a shell fired from the other side hit an Indian paramilitary installation nearby, making a long hissing noise before striking with a thud.
Hours after Sheikh spoke to Al Jazeera for this report, another shell landed on his home. The rooms and the portico of his house collapsed, according to a video he shared with Al Jazeera.
He had refused to leave his home despite his family’s pleas to join them. “I was here to protect our livestock,” Sheikh said. “I didn’t want to leave them alone.”
Unlike the rest of the Kashmir Valley, where apple cultivation brings millions of dollars in income for the region, Uri is relatively poor. Villagers mostly work odd jobs for the Indian Army, which maintains large garrisons there, or farm walnuts and pears. Livestock rearing has turned into a popular vocation for many in the town.
“We have seen the firsthand experience of what war feels like. It is good that the ceasefire has taken place. But I don’t know if it will hold or not,” Sheikh said, his face downcast. “I pray that it does.”
People walk at a open market, a day after the ceasefire between India and Pakistan in Srinagar, in Indian-administered Kashmir, Sunday, May 11, 2025 [Mukhtar Khan/AP Photo]
‘How long must this continue?’
Back in Srinagar, residents are slowly returning to the rhythm of their daily lives. Schools and colleges continue to remain closed, and people are avoiding unnecessary travel.
The scenes of racing drone fleets in the skies and the accompanying blasts are seared into public memory. “Only in the evening will we come to know whether this ceasefire has held on,” said Muskaan Wani, a student of medicine at Government Medical College, Srinagar, said on Sunday.
It did, overnight, but the tension over whether it will last remains.
Political experts attribute the general scepticism about the ceasefire to the unresolved political issues in the region – a point that was echoed in Trump’s statement on Sunday, in which he referred to a possible “solution concerning Kashmir”.
“The problem to begin with is the political alienation [of Kashmiris],” said Noor Ahmad Baba, a former professor and head of the political science department at the University of Kashmir.
“People in Kashmir feel humiliated for what has happened to them in the last few years, and there haven’t been any significant efforts to win them over. When there’s humiliation, there is suspicion.”
Others in Indian-administered Kashmir expressed their anger at both countries for ruining their lives.
“I doubt that our feelings as Kashmiris even matter,” said Furqan, a software engineer in Srinagar who only gave his first name. “Two nuclear powers fought, caused damage and casualties at the borders, gave their respective nations a spectacle to watch, their goals were achieved, and then they stopped the war.
“But the question is, who suffered the most? It’s us. For the world, we are nothing but collateral damage.”
Furqan said his friends were sceptical about the ceasefire when the two countries resumed shelling on the evening of May 10.
“We all already were like, ‘It is not gonna last,’” he said, “And then we heard the explosions again.”
Muneeb Mehraj, a 26-year-old resident of Srinagar who studies management in the northern Indian state of Punjab, echoed Furqan.
“For others, the war may be over. A ceasefire has been declared. But once again, it’s Kashmiris who have paid the price – lives lost, homes destroyed, peace shattered,” he said. “How long must this cycle continue?”
“We are exhausted,” Mehraj continued. “We don’t want another temporary pause. We want a lasting, permanent solution.”
These are the key events on day 1,172 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Here is where things stand on Sunday, May 11:
Fighting:
Politics and diplomacy:
Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed direct talks with Ukraine in Istanbul, Turkiye, on Thursday “without preconditions” to achieve “lasting peace” and “eliminate the root causes” of the three-year conflict.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on Russia to confirm an unconditional 30-day ceasefire beginning on Monday, saying Ukraine would then be ready to meet for direct talks with Russia.
United States President Donald Trump described the talks offer as a “potentially great day for Russia and Ukraine”.
On Saturday, Zelenskyy received the backing of Europe’s major powers and Trump for the unconditional 30-day ceasefire beginning on Monday.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told his Russian and French counterparts that a “historic turning point” has been reached in efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war and Ankara was ready to host talks between the two warring parties, his office said.
Macron said Putin’s offer to start direct talks with Ukraine is “a first step but not enough”, arguing that an unconditional ceasefire that Kyiv and its allies have called for should happen first. Macron accused Putin of “looking for a way out, but he still wants to buy time”.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called Putin’s proposal for direct talks with Kyiv a “serious proposal” that is a step towards “lasting peace”.
Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal said the US and Europe are collectively ramping up pressure on Russia to push through a ceasefire. “I think the American administration is also getting a little bit impatient with these Russian games,” Michal said, accusing Russia of dragging its feet in implementing a truce.
In announcing this new holiday, Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka said: “They were starting a new life in an unknown land and stayed to become an integral part of our country. I reconfirm my promise to inaugurate a new national holiday in 2023.”
The word girmit represented an Indian pronunciation of the English language word “agreement” – from the indenture “agreement” of the British Government with Indian labourers. The agreements specified the workers’ length of stay in foreign parts and the conditions attached to their return to the British Raj.
The colonial authorities promoted the sugar cane industry, recognising the need to establish a stable economic base for the colony, but were unwilling to exploit indigenous labour and threaten the Fijian way of life. The use of imported labour from the Solomon Islands and what is now Vanuatu generated protests in the United Kingdom, and the Governor Sir Arthur Hamilton-Gordon decided to implement the indentured labour scheme, which had existed in the British Empire since 1837.
The Leonidas, a labour transport vessel, disembarked at Levuka from Calcutta on May 14th 1879. The 498 indentured workers who disembarked were the first of over 61,000 to arrive from South and East Asia in the following 37 years. The majority were from the districts of eastern and southern provinces, followed by labourers from northern and western regions, then later south eastern countries, they originated from different regions, villages, backgrounds and castes that later mingled or intermarried hence the “Fijian Indian” identity was created. The indentured workers originated mostly from rural village backgrounds.
After five years of work in the cane fields, the British freed the girmits from bonded labour but did not offer them a passage back. So, most of them stayed back and by the mid-1980s their descendants through hard work and education have made a mark in Fiji dominating business and professional fields.
By this time Indo-Fijians made up 49% of the population but indigenous Fijians controlled land ownership. In April 1987, for the first time since independence in 1970, Fiji elected a multi-ethnic Fiji Labour Party to power supported mainly by Indo-Fijian voters but led by indigenous Fijian academic Dr Timoci Bavadra. Most of the Cabinet however were Indo-Fijians.
The first head-to-head trial of two blockbuster weight-loss drugs has shown Mounjaro is more effective than rival Wegovy.
Both drugs led to substantial weight loss, but Mounjaro’s 20% weight reduction, after 72 weeks of treatment, exceeded the 14% from Wegovy, according to the trial’s findings.
Researchers who led the trial said both drugs had a role, but Mounjaro may help those with the most weight to lose.
Both drugs trick the brain into making you feel full so you eat less and instead burn fat stored in the body – but subtle differences in how they work to explain the difference in effectiveness.
Wegovy, also known as semaglutide, mimics a hormone released by the body after a meal to flip one appetite switch in the brain. Mounjaro, or tirzepatide, flips two.
The trial, which was paid for by Eli Lilly, the manufacturer of Mounjaro, involved 750 obese people, with an average weight of 113kg (nearly 18 stone).
They were asked to take the highest dose they could tolerate of one of the two drugs.
32% of people lost a quarter of their body weight on Mounjaro compared to 16% on Wegovy
Those on Mounjaro lost an average of 18cm from their waistlines compared with 13cm on Wegovy.
Those on Mounjaro had better blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels.
Both had similar levels of side-effects.
Women tended to lose more weight than men.
Dr Louis Aronne, who conducted the trial at the Comprehensive Weight Control Center at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, said: “The majority of people with obesity will do just fine with semaglatide (Wegovy), those at the higher end may ultimately do better with tirzepatide (Mounjaro).”
Private tirzepatide sales ‘well ahead of semaglutide’
In the UK, the two medicines are available from specialist weight-management services, but can also be bought privately.
Prof Naveed Sattar, from the University of Glasgow, said the drugs were “good options” for patients, but while “many will be satisfied with 15% weight loss… many want as much weight loss as possible”.
“In the UK, tirzepatide sales privately are now well ahead of semaglutide – that’s just a reality – and this paper will accelerate that I imagine,” he added.
However, Wegovy is also licensed for other conditions – such as preventing heart attacks – while the equivalent trials with Mounjaro have not been completed.
A huge amount of research into weight-loss drugs is still taking place. Higher doses of current drugs are being tested, as are new ways of taking them such as oral pills and new medicines that act on the body in different ways are being investigated.
It means the final winner in this field has yet to be determined.
Prof Sattar says the amount of research taking place means we may be approaching the point where “obesity prevention may also be possible soon”, but argues “it would be far better” to make our society healthier to prevent people becoming obese.
