war

The attack by the paramilitary on the hospital wounded 17 others, and is the second such attack in 24 hours.

At least 12 people have been killed and 17 were wounded when the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) shelled a hospital in Sudan’s North Darfur state, medical sources said.

A female doctor and a nursing staff member were among the injured in the attack on the el-Fasher Hospital, the Sudan Doctors Network said in a statement on Wednesday.

The medical group said the RSF “directly bombed” the facility. It alleged the attack was a “full-fledged war crime” and showed “a complete disregard for the lives of civilians and international laws that protect health facilities and their workers”.

The group held the RSF “fully responsible” for the attack and appealed to the international community and the United Nations Security Council to take immediate action to stop attacks on health facilities and civilian homes and to protect the devastated health system in the besieged city.

The hospital is one of the last functioning health facilities in the city, with most repeatedly bombed and forced to shut.

Two medical sources confirmed Wednesday’s attack, which was the second on the hospital within 24 hours, after eight people were killed in an attack on a maternity ward on Tuesday.

The RSF is pressing a fierce assault on el-Fasher in an attempt to wrest control of the city away from its rivals, the regular Sudanese army.

Since April 2023, the war between the two forces has killed tens of thousands, displaced some 15 million and pushed nearly 25 million people into acute hunger, according to UN figures, triggering what has widely been described as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.

Some activists say el-Fasher, the last state capital in the vast western Darfur region to elude the paramilitary’s grasp, has become “an open-air morgue” for starved civilians.

The RSF has imposed a blockade on el-Fasher since May 10, 2024, despite international warnings about the dangers to the city, a hub for humanitarian operations in the five Darfur states.

Nearly 80 percent of households in need of medical care in el-Fasher are unable to access it, according to the UN.

Exhausted medical teams are already scrambling to treat the injured amid daily attacks on the city.

Nearly 18 months into the RSF’s siege, the city – home to 400,000 trapped civilians – has run out of nearly everything. The animal feed families have survived on for months has grown scarce and now costs hundreds of dollars a sack.

The majority of the city’s soup kitchens have also been forced shut for lack of food, according to local resistance committees, volunteer groups that coordinate aid.

More than one million people have fled el-Fasher since the start of Sudan’s civil war, with the exodus dramatically escalating as the RSF has increased attacks following its loss of control of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, earlier this year.

About 200 people gathered on Paramount’s Melrose Avenue lot for a screening of “Red Alert,” a four-part scripted drama portraying the deadly Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel from the perspective of six victims.

The host of the Sept. 30 event was Paramount Chairman and Chief Executive David Ellison, who shared how he had chatted with Academy Award-nominated producer Lawrence Bender a few weeks earlier at a memorial service for legendary Hollywood power broker Skip Brittenham. That’s where Ellison learned that Bender’s Israeli-backed series, “Red Alert,” needed a home in the U.S.

Ellison quickly volunteered. “It was a fast ‘yes,’ ” he told the group.

On Tuesday, “Red Alert” debuted on the company’s streaming service, Paramount+, marking the second anniversary of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel. The initial Hamas assault left about 1,200 Israelis dead and more than 250 kidnapped.

The high-profile project comes two months after Ellison assumed control of Paramount in an $8-billion buyout by his family, led by billionaire and Oracle founder Larry Ellison, and private equity firm RedBird Capital Partners.

Since the deal closed Aug. 7, David Ellison has moved to position the company slightly right of the political center, while also taking on polarizing issues. The scion has been unafraid to challenge those in Hollywood who’ve called for a boycott of Israel.

More than two years after the Oct. 7 attack, a deep divide remains in Hollywood over the subsequent Israel-Hamas war.

Last month, Paramount condemned an open letter in support of Palestinians, which has gained steam in Hollywood. More than 5,000 people have signed the Film Workers for Palestine letter, including such prominent filmmakers as Adam McKay, Ava DuVernay, Alex Gibney and Hannah Einbinder.

The effort called for a boycott of Israeli film festivals, institutions and projects to help spur an end to the war in Gaza. The campaign was designed in the vein of South African boycotts decades ago, which proved to be instrumental in ending apartheid, that country’s racial segregation.

No other major studio followed Paramount.

In its Sept. 12 statement, Paramount said it disagreed with the Film Workers call to avoid film screenings or to work with Israeli film institutions.

“At Paramount, we believe in the power of storytelling to connect and inspire people, promote mutual understanding, and preserve the moments, ideas, and events that shape the world we share,” the company said. “Silencing individual creative artists based on their nationality does not promote better understanding or advance the cause of peace.”

The Film Workers group accused Paramount of misrepresenting the intent of its pledge, saying it did not target individual filmmakers.

But critics counter that filmmakers who engage with Israeli cultural institutions would likely fall under the ban.

More than 1,200 industry players including actors Mayim Bialik and Liev Schreiber and Paramount board member Sherry Lansing signed an opposing open letter released by the nonprofit organization Creative Community For Peace that accuses the Film Workers for Palestine of advocating “arbitrary censorship and the erasure of art.”

The Palestinian supporters dismissed the characterization. “The Film Workers Pledge to End Complicity is an explicitly anti-racist and non-violent campaign that is grounded in international law and the moral clarity of a global majority opposed to genocide,” the group said in a statement this week. “It is the first major refusal of the international film industry at large that targets complicit Israeli film institutions and companies.”

“Red Alert” was co-produced by a prominent Israeli production company, Keshet Media Group, and received funding from the Jewish National Fund-USA and the Israel Entertainment Fund. The series premiered last weekend on Israel’s popular television channel Keshet 12. Keshet produced the Hebrew-language series “Prisoners of War” that Showtime later adapted into the award-winning American drama “Homeland.”

During the late September screening at Paramount, Ellison spoke of the need for such projects as “Red Alert” to remember the atrocities as well as stories of survival and heroism.

“We at Paramount, we are here to tell stories that last forever,” Ellison said. “We are not here to debate politics or platforms or to argue about east or west. And ‘Red Alert’ is the very embodiment of that mission, and I couldn’t be prouder to support this series.”

Critics note that Ellison’s father, Larry, the co-founder of Oracle, is a prominent supporter of Israel, contributing millions to the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces.

Others in Hollywood have found fault with Israel’s government and its conduct in the Gaza war, which has killed more than 67,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians or combatants.

The United Nations, rights groups, experts and many Western governments accuse Israel of committing genocide. Israel denies the charge.

During a May 2024 Simon Wiesenthal Center gala in his honor, WME Group Executive Chairman Ari Emanuel sharply denounced Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and called for his ouster. Emanuel’s remarks were met with cheers and jeers and some attendees walked out.

In his Oscar acceptance speech last year, Jonathan Glazer, director of the Holocaust drama “The Zone of Interest,” asked “Whether the victims of October 7th in Israel or the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization — how do we resist?”

Weeks later, Steven Spielberg called out the rise of antisemitism as well as the ongoing war.

“We can rage against the heinous acts committed by the terrorists of October 7th and also decry the killing of innocent women and children in Gaza,” Spielberg said during an event celebrating the anniversary of the USC Shoah Foundation.

Paramount’s opposition to the Film Workers’ pledge and other recent moves, including buying the Free Press news site for $150 million and installing its founder, journalist Bari Weiss, as the editor in chief at CBS News, has rattled a small group of Paramount employees.

David Ellison recruited Weiss, who has been public about her support for Israel, for the prominent role.

The division was roiled by Paramount’s efforts to settle President Trump’s lawsuit over edits to a “60 Minutes” interview a year ago with then-Vice President Kamala Harris. Paramount this summer agreed to pay $16 million to end Trump’s suit, which 1st Amendment experts viewed as a spurious shakedown.

Weeks later, Trump appointees on the Federal Communications Commission approved the Ellison family’s takeover of Paramount.

The employee group, which calls itself Paramount Employees of Conscience, said they have sent two letters to Paramount leaders in the last month to voice their concerns but have not received a reply. In a statement, the group noted that while Paramount+ was distributing “Red Alert,” the company had not offered “equivalent programming about Palestinian experiences of the genocide in Gaza.”

“How can a company with this supposed creative mission actively ignore, suppress, and silence internal calls for years to champion stories that shed a light on the reality that marginalized and excluded communities, particularly Palestinians, face every day?” the group asked in a Sept. 17 letter addressed to Paramount’s leadership.

Paramount declined to comment.

The group includes about 30 employees, according to one member who asked not to be identified out of fear of retribution.

Paramount employees separately are bracing for a steep round of layoffs, which is expected next month. Ellison’s firm Skydance Media and RedBird promised Wall Street that they would find more than $2 billion in cost cuts at Paramount.

“We know the Ellisons are formidable, powerful and have a lot of resources,” said the Paramount employee. “But we are here to interrupt a culture of silence…. Silence within the industry becomes complicity.”

The European Union’s plan to hike tariffs on steel imported over and above its annual threshold could tip the United Kingdom’s steel industry into its worst crisis in history, industry leaders have warned.

On Tuesday, the European Commission proposed that the 27-member bloc would slash its tariff-free steel import quota by 47 percent to 18.3 million tonnes and would impose a tariff of 50 percent on any steel imported in excess of this amount.

This represents a sharp hike: The EU’s current annual steel import quota stands at 33 million tonnes, and imports above this limit are subject to a 25 percent tariff.

The announcement has rattled the British steel industry, which exports nearly 80 percent of its steel to the EU.

“This is perhaps the biggest crisis the UK steel industry has ever faced,” Gareth Stace, director general of the lobby group UK Steel, said on Tuesday. He described the move as a “disaster” for British steel.

Community, a trade union representing UK steelworkers, said the EU’s proposal represents an “existential threat” to the UK steel industry.

Here’s what we know about the EU’s new levies and why the UK is worried:

Why has the EU announced a tariff hike for steel imports?

The new tariff is expected to come into effect from June 2026, as long as EU countries and the European Parliament approve it.

The EU says it has no choice but to bring in the new tariff as it seeks to protect its own markets from a flood of subsidised Asian steel, which has been diverted by US President Donald Trump’s latest 50 percent tariff on all steel imports to the US.

The EU also wants to protect its steel sector from the challenge of global overcapacity.

In a speech at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday, the European Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security, Maros Sefcovic, defended the bloc’s steel tariffs proposal as a move to “protect the bloc’s vital sector” whose steel trade balance has “deteriorated dramatically”.

Sefcovic added that more than 30,000 jobs have been lost since 2018 in the EU’s steel industry, which employs about 300,000 people overall.

While the industry is ailing, he said, other countries have begun imposing tariffs and other safeguards to ensure their own domestic steel industries expand. The Commission’s proposal, therefore, seeks to “restore balance to the EU steel market”.

More succinctly, a senior EU official told The Times newspaper: “My dear UK friends, you have to understand that we have no choice but to limit the total volumes of imports that come into the EU, so this is the logic that we apply clearly. Not acting could result in potentially fatal effects for us.”

The EC’s proposal comes as the bloc’s steel sector faces stiff competition from countries like China, where steel production is heavily subsidised.

China produced more than a billion metric tonnes of steel last year, followed by India, at 149 million metric tonnes, and Japan, at 84 million metric tonnes, according to the World Steel Association, a nonprofit organisation with headquarters in Brussels.

By comparison, said Sefcovic, the EU produces 126 million tonnes per year but only requires 67 percent of this for its own use – “well below the healthy 80 percent benchmark and below profitable levels”.

Moreover, steel production within the EU has declined by 65 million tonnes per year since 2007 – with nearly half of that lost since 2018.

“A strong, decarbonised steel sector is vital for the European Union’s competitiveness, economic security and strategic autonomy. Global overcapacity is damaging our industry,” EC President Ursula von der Leyen said.

The Commission’s industry chief, Stephane Sejourne, told reporters in Strasbourg that “the European steel industry was on the verge of collapse” and said that through the tariffs plan, the Commission is “protecting it [EU’s steel industry] so that it can invest, decarbonise and become competitive again”.

Sejourne added that the Commission’s plan is “in line with our [EU] values and international law”.

Why would the UK bear the brunt of EU steel tariffs?

The EU is the UK’s largest market for steel exports by far. In 2024, the UK exported 1.9 million metric tonnes of steel, worth about 3 billion pounds ($4.02bn) and representing 78 percent of its home-made steel products to the EU.

While the EC’s steel tariffs proposal does not apply to members of the European Economic Area, namely Norway and Iceland, it will apply to the UK and Switzerland. Ukraine will also be exempt from the tariff quota since it is facing “an exceptional and immediate security situation”, according to the EC.

The EU says it is open to negotiations with the UK once it has formally notified the World Trade Organization (WTO) of the new levy. For now, however, uncertainty looms.

Compounding this, the UK also fears being flooded by cheaper, subsidised steel from Asia as both the EU and US markets close their doors to it.

In a statement, UK Steel added: “The potential for millions of tonnes that will be barred from the EU market, to be redirected towards the UK is another existential threat.”

Nicolai von Ondarza, an associate fellow at Chatham House, the London-based policy institute, told Al Jazeera that cheap steel diverted by the EU’s planned tariffs will mostly come from countries like China, “putting additional pressure on its industry”.

The British steel sector is also shouldering Trump’s 25 percent tariff on British steel imports, a global supply glut, and higher energy prices, and has been embattled by job losses in some of its biggest steelworks due to green transition initiatives.

Can the UK negotiate its way out of this?

That is currently its best hope, according to industry leaders.

“We would urge the UK and EU to begin urgent negotiations and do everything possible to prevent the crushing impact these proposals would have on our steel industry,” he added.

Chatham House’s Ondarza told Al Jazeera: “For the UK, the first route is to try to negotiate a carve-out of these EU tariffs. Both the EC and the UK have already signalled willingness to talk. These negotiations are likely to be tricky, but not unlikely that they come to an agreement.”

On his way for a two-day business trip to India, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer told reporters that his country is “in discussions with the EU” about the proposal.

“I’ll be able to tell you more in due course, but we are in discussions, as you’d expect,” he said.

Meanwhile, Chris McDonald, the UK industry minister, has suggested that retaliatory measures may not be completely off the table.

“We continue to explore stronger trade measures to protect UK steel producers from unfair behaviours,” he told reporters.

If the US caused this, can it help to solve it?

While the EU’s tariffs proposal has led to an outcry in the UK, it is also a measure which seeks to bring the US to the negotiating table, the EC says.

In August, the EU and US agreed a trade deal under which Washington will levy 15 percent tariffs on 70 percent of Europe’s exports to the country. Brussels and Washington have yet to discuss how tariffs would apply to European steel, which still faces a 50 percent tariff under Trump’s new trade regime.

Sefcovic told reporters the Commission’s steel tariffs proposal would be a good foundation to engage with the US and also fight the challenge of overcapacity as “like-minded partners”.

Here are the key events from day 1,322 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Wednesday, October 8, 2025:

Fighting

• Russian President Vladimir Putin said his forces have captured almost 5,000 square kilometres (1,930sq miles) of Ukrainian territory so far this year, and Moscow retains the strategic initiative on the battlefield.
• Russian troops have captured the Ukrainian villages of Novovasylivka in the southeastern Zaporizhia region and Fedorivka in the eastern Donetsk region, Russia’s defence ministry said.
• Russian air defence units destroyed 184 Ukrainian drones in recent attacks, the RIA Novosti state-owned news agency reports.
• Russia’s air defence units also intercepted and destroyed a drone flying towards Moscow city, said Sergei Sobyanin, mayor of the Russian capital.

• Ukraine’s Energy Minister Svitlana Hrynchuk said Russian air strikes have caused “significant” damage to Ukrainian gas production capacity due to the targeting of regional gas infrastructure and power transmission facilities in front-line regions.
• Hrynchuk said Ukraine wants to increase imports of natural gas by 30 percent after Russian attacks on its gas infrastructure, telling reporters she had discussed additional gas imports with Group of Seven (G7) member states.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of using oil tankers for intelligence gathering and sabotage operations, and he added that Ukraine was cooperating with its allies on the matter.
• Russia’s state nuclear energy company has claimed that a Ukrainian drone attempted to strike a nuclear plant in Russia’s Voronezh region bordering Ukraine, but the unmanned aerial vehicle crashed into a cooling tower and caused no damage at the site.

Military aid

• Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Russia was waiting for clarity from the United States about the possible supply of Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, saying such weapons could theoretically carry nuclear warheads and reiterated that Moscow would see the provision of such weapons as a serious escalation.
• The Kremlin also said it assumed for now that US President Donald Trump still sought a peace settlement in Ukraine.

Peace talks

• Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke by phone with President Putin and said diplomatic initiatives need to gain momentum to achieve a just and lasting peace in the Russia-Ukraine war, Erdogan’s office said.
• The statement cited Erdogan as saying Turkiye will continue to work for peace and said bilateral relations and regional and global issues were also discussed with Putin.
• Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said she believed Trump had come to the conclusion that Russia was not interested in a peace deal with Ukraine, and that the only way forward was to apply pressure, continue to support Ukraine, and impose sanctions on Russia.

Politics and diplomacy

• Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said it is not in Poland’s interest to hand over a Ukrainian man wanted by Germany for suspected involvement in explosions which damaged the Nord Stream gas pipelines three years ago.
• Tusk said the problem with Nord Stream 2 was not that it was blown up but that it was built. He added that Russia built the pipelines “against the vital interests not only of our countries, but of all of Europe”.
• A Polish court ruled on Monday that the Ukrainian diver wanted by Germany over his alleged involvement in the explosions, which damaged the Nord Stream gas pipeline, must remain in custody for another 40 days, his lawyer said.
• European Union governments have agreed to impose limits on the travel of Russian diplomats within the bloc, the Financial Times reported.

Economy

• Ukraine’s foreign currency reserves totalled $46.5bn as of October 1, the National Bank of Ukraine reported on its website.

Hamas and Israel have concluded a second day of indirect negotiations on United States President Donald Trump’s proposal to end the war on Gaza, as senior Qatari and US officials headed to Egypt to join the talks.

Speaking at the White House on the second anniversary of the start of the war, Trump said that there was a “real chance” of a Gaza deal, as Tuesday’s talks wrapped up in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh.

However, the day had opened with an umbrella of Palestinian factions – including Hamas – issuing a statement that promised a “resistance stance by all means”, stressing that “no one has the right to cede the weapons of the Palestinian people” – an apparent reference to a key demand for the disarmament of the armed group contained in Trump’s 20-point plan.

Senior Hamas official Fawzi Barhoum said that the group’s negotiators were seeking an end to the war and “complete withdrawal of the occupation army” from Gaza. But Trump’s plan is vague regarding the exit of Israeli troops, offering no specific timeline for the staged rollout, which would only happen after Hamas returns the 48 Israeli captives it still holds, 20 of whom are thought to be alive.

A senior Hamas official who spoke to Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity after Tuesday’s talks indicated that the group intends to release captives in stages linked to the withdrawal of Israel’s military from Gaza.

The official said that Tuesday’s talks had focused on scheduling the release of Israeli captives and withdrawal maps for Israeli forces, with the group stressing that the release of the last Israeli hostage must coincide with the final withdrawal of Israeli forces.

Hamas’s top negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, said the group did “not trust the occupation, not even for a second”, according to Egyptian state-linked Al Qahera News. He said Hamas wanted “real guarantees” that the war would end and not be restarted, accusing Israel of violating two ceasefires in the war on Gaza.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a statement to mark the anniversary of the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, that sparked Israel’s war on Gaza, calling the last two years of conflict a “war for our very existence and future”.

He said that Israel was “in fateful days of decision”, without alluding directly to the ceasefire talks. Israel, he said, would “continue to act to achieve all the war’s objectives: the return of all the hostages, the elimination of Hamas’s rule, and ensuring that Gaza will no longer pose a threat to Israel”.

Staying flexible

Despite signs of continued differences, the talks appear to be the most promising sign of progress towards ending the war yet, with Israel and Hamas both endorsing many parts of Trump’s plan.

Qatar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Majed al-Ansari said the mediators – Qatar, Egypt and Turkiye – were staying flexible and developing ideas as the ceasefire talks progress.

“We don’t go with preconceived notions to the negotiations. We develop these formulations during the talks themselves, which is happening right now,” he said.

Al-Ansari told Al Jazeera that Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani will join other mediators – including Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner for the US – on Wednesday in Egypt.

Sheikh Mohammed’s “participation confirms the mediators’ determination to reach an agreement that ends the war”, al-Ansari said.

Even if a deal is clinched, questions linger about who will govern Gaza and rebuild it, and who will finance the huge cost of reconstruction.

Trump and Netanyahu have ruled out any role for Hamas, with the former’s plan proposing that Palestinian “technocrats” run day-to-day affairs in Gaza under an international transitional governance body – the so-called “Board of Peace” – that would be overseen by Trump himself and the divisive former United Kingdom Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Hamas’s Barhoum said the group wanted to see “the immediate start of the comprehensive reconstruction process under the supervision of a Palestinian national body”.

Israeli attacks continue

The second anniversary of the war, which was sparked by deadly attacks on Israel that were led by Hamas on October 7, 2023, saw Israel pressing on with its offensive in Gaza, drones and fighter jets strafing the skies, targeting the Sabra and Tal al-Hawa residential areas in Gaza City and the road to nearby Shati camp.

At least 10 Palestinians were killed in Israeli attacks across Gaza on Tuesday, according to the official Palestinian news agency Wafa, adding to the grim toll of more than 66,600 deaths over the entire conflict. At least 104 people have been killed in Gaza by Israeli forces since Friday, the day Trump called on Israel to halt its bombing campaign.

Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said on Tuesday that a boy had been shot in the head in eastern Gaza and that at least six Palestinians were killed in separate attacks across Khan Younis in the south of the Strip.

“Everyone’s waiting for a peace deal as the bombs continue to fall,” she said, reporting from az-Zuwayda in central Gaza. “The Israeli forces continue destroying entire residential neighbourhoods and residential areas where Palestinians thought they would go back and rebuild their lives.”

Marking the anniversary, ACLED, a US-based conflict monitor, said Gaza has endured more than 11,110 air and drone strikes and at least 6,250 shelling and artillery attacks throughout the war. Gaza’s dead accounted for 14 percent of total reported deaths from conflicts worldwide over the past two years.

The Gaza Health Ministry said 1,701 medical personnel had been killed in Gaza during the war.

Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim al-Khalili reflects on the two years since Israel’s war on Gaza began, sharing a personal story of displacement, loss, and suffering.

Before the October 7 attacks, Benjamin Netanyahu was facing down mass protests, a corruption trial and speculation he would end up resigning or in jail. He is still in power. So, after two years of war, how do Israeli’s now view him? Soraya Lennie explains.

As mediators and officials from Israel and Hamas meet in Egypt to discuss end of war, deadly Israeli attacks continue across Gaza.

Oct. 6 (UPI) — The International Criminal Court convicted Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman for committing human rights atrocities as the infamous leader of the Sudanese militia known as the Janjaweed.

Prosecutors hailed the conviction of Abd-Al-Rahman, also known by his nom de guerre Ali Kushayb, as the first verdict against a militia leader for waging a brutal campaign of ethnically motivated violence two decades ago against the civilian population in Sudan’s Darfur region.

The conflict in Darfur is considered the first genocide of the 21st century and unfolded between 2003 and 2020, when ethnic-based rebel groups took up arms against Sudan’s autocratic government. In response, the Sudanese government unleashed its own militias including the Janjaweed, whose name means “devils on horseback.”

The United Nations estimates that roughly 300,000 people died and another 400,000 were forced to flee to neighboring Chad.

The panel of judges overseeing the case in The Hague found that Al-Rahman was responsible for overseeing thousands of government-allied forces that carried out mass executions, torture and the burning and pillaging of entire villages.

“The conviction of Mr Abd-Al-Rahman is a crucial step towards closing the impunity gap in Darfur,” Deputy Prosecutor Nazhat Shameem Khan said in a statement. “It sends a resounding message to perpetrators of atrocities in Sudan, both past and present, that justice will prevail, and that they will be held accountable for inflicting unspeakable suffering on Darfuri civilians, men, women and children.”

First charged in 2007, Al-Rahman was on the run for 13 years before surrendering to authorities in the Central African Republic. He has denied the charges and his defense argued during the trial that he had been misidentified.

The court’s prosecutors are still pursuing warrants against Sudan’s former President Omar al-Bashir, former Interior Minister Ahmad Harun and ex-Defense Minister Abdel Raheem Hussein.

Tigere Chagutah, a regional director for Amnesty International, said in a statement following the verdict that the conviction should serve as a warning to those involved in the current conflict in Sudan, where the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces is accused of committing genocide.

“This long overdue verdict goes some way in providing justice for the victims of Ali Kushayb and should serve as a significant milestone in the pursuit of justice for crimes committed in Darfur more than two-decades ago,” Chagutah said.

Election marks landmark moment in country’s post-war transition, but vote is postponed in Druze and Kurdish areas.

Syria has published the results of its first parliamentary election since the government of former President Bashar al-Assad was toppled, revealing that most new members of the revamped People’s Assembly are Sunni Muslim and male.

Electoral commission spokesperson Nawar Najmeh told a press conference on Monday that only four percent of the 119 members selected in the indirect vote were women and only two Christians were among the winners, sparking concerns about inclusivity and fairness.

The election represents a landmark moment in the country’s fragile transition after nearly 14 years of war, but critics say it favours well-connected figures and is likely to keep power concentrated in the hands of Syria’s new rulers, rather than paving the way for genuine democratic change.

News agency AFP cited Najmeh as saying that the number of women in the parliament was “not proportionate to the status of women in Syrian society and their role in political, economic and social life”.

He called the representation of Christians “weak, considering the proportion of Christians in Syria”.

The authorities resorted to an indirect voting system rather than universal suffrage, alluding to a lack of reliable population data following the war, which killed hundreds of thousands of Syrians and displaced millions.

Sunni Muslims make up an estimated 75 percent of Syrians. The former al-Assad regime, which was overthrown in December after a nearly 14-year civil war, was largely headed by Syrians from the Alawite minority.

Sunday’s vote saw around 6,000 members of regional electoral colleges choose candidates from preapproved lists, part of a process to produce nearly two-thirds of the new 210-seat body. President Ahmed al-Sharaa will later select the remaining third.

Citing security and political reasons, authorities postponed the vote in areas outside government control, including Kurdish-held parts of Syria’s north and northeast, as well as the province of Suwayda, held by the Druze minority. Those suspensions left 21 seats empty.

Najmeh was cited by news agency AFP as saying the state was “serious” about having “supplementary ballots” to fill the assembly’s seats.

Reporting from Damascus, Al Jazeera’s Osama Bin Javaid said: “If you ask the Druze in the south or the Kurds in the north, they say [the elections] were not representative.

“If you ask people in major cities, like Aleppo, Damascus, Hama, and other parts of the country, they’re hopeful that this is the first taste of a real election.”

On March 10, Syria’s Kurds and Damascus agreed to integrate Kurdish-administered civil and military institutions in the country’s northeast into the state by the year’s end, but negotiations on implementing the deal have stalled.

Delays in implementing the March 10 agreement meant there were no timetables as yet for ballots in Raqqa and Hasakeh, according to Najmeh.

Najmeh said that the president’s choice would perhaps “compensate” for some underrepresented components of Syrian society, but he rejected the idea of a quota-based system.

Political and rights activist Nour al-Jandali, who was selected for a seat in central Syria’s city of Homs, was quoted by AFP as saying the new lawmakers “have a great responsibility”.

She noted challenges the new legislature faces, including “how we re-establish a state built on freedom, citizenship and justice”, adding that “women must have a real and active role” in drafting public policy.

Pressing for stiffened sanctions, president says more than 100,000 components from US, UK and other suppliers found in Russian missiles and drones fired on Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has alleged that drones and missiles fired by Russia against his country are filled with parts sourced from Western companies.

In a social media post on Monday, Zelenskyy said the hundreds of weapons used in Russian attacks over the previous two nights contained tens of thousands of components produced by firms in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, South Korea, the Netherlands, Taiwan and China.

“Nearly 100,688 of foreign-made parts were in the launched attack drones, about 1,500 were in Iskanders, 192 in Kinzhal missiles, and 405 in Kalibrs,” he wrote.

He made the accusation as Ukraine and some European partners are pressing for harsher sanctions and stronger oversight to close loopholes on current trade limits imposed in the wake of Russia’s invasion of its neighbouring country in February 2022.

Zelenskyy’s inclusion of US and UK companies was noteworthy due to the leading role the two countries have had in mobilising military and financial support for Ukraine as it battles Russia’s invading forces.

US companies manufacture converters for Kh-101 missiles and Shahed-type drones, sensors for unmanned aerial vehicles and Kinzhal missiles, and microelectronics for missiles, the Ukrainian president said. He added that British companies produce microcomputers for drone flight control.

“Ukraine is preparing new sanctions against those who help Russia and its war,” Zelenskyy said, adding that detailed data on each company and product have been shared with Ukraine’s partners.

Zelenskyy, who has long called on countries around the world to prevent the funding and equipping of Russia’s war machine, demanded more robust measures before a meeting of G7 sanctions coordinators, a body that oversees sanctions regimes among the club of the world’s wealthiest countries.

Oleh Alexandrov, a Ukrainian intelligence official, said over the weekend that Kyiv has evidence that China has been helping Moscow identify targets in Ukraine. He said there was “evidence of a high level of cooperation between Russia and China in conducting satellite reconnaissance of the territory of Ukraine in order to identify and further explore strategic objects for targeting”.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov denied reliance on China’s satellites and said Russia has its “own capabilities, including space capabilities, to accomplish all the tasks the special military operation poses”.

Zelenskyy issued his statement as a number of European countries have been dealing with a wave of suspicious drone activity.

Unmanned aerial vehicles have been spotted over military sites and disrupted air traffic. Some governments have pointed a finger at Russia and warned that Moscow is testing NATO’s air defences.

Russia has denied responsibility, and President Vladimir Putin has mocked countries accusing Moscow of being behind the drone incursions.

On Monday, the Kremlin dismissed as “baseless” comments by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who said his country assumes Russia was behind the activity.

Oslo Airport, meanwhile, temporarily suspended several landings on Monday after reports of a drone, its operator, Avinor, said.

The International Criminal Court has found Sudanese militia chief Ali Muhammad Ali Abd-Al-Rahman guilty of war crimes committed during Sudan’s Darfur conflict more than two decades ago. He was accused of playing a crucial role in the atrocities that killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Kyiv, Ukraine – On October 2, Russian President Vladimir Putin alleged that Ukrainian attacks had destroyed a high-voltage transmission line between the Moscow-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine and Kyiv-controlled areas.

Days earlier, Ukraine’s leader, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said Russian shelling had cut the plant off from the electricity network.

The mammoth, six-reactor plant – Europe’s largest and known in Ukraine as the ZAES – sits less than 10km (6.2 miles) south of the front line. It has been shut since 2022, generating none of the electricity that once provided up to a fifth of Ukraine’s needs.

But dozens of Moscow-deployed engineers have frantically tried to restart it – so far unsuccessfully. Ukraine has long feared that Russia is trying to connect the power grid and quench a thirst for energy in Crimea and other occupied areas.

Putin purported that the alleged Ukrainian strikes caused a blackout at the plant and that it had to be fuelled by diesel generators.

The latest blackout at the plant is the longest wartime outage of power.

“On the [Ukrainian] side, people should understand that if they play so dangerously, they have an operating nuclear power station on their side,” Putin told a forum in St Petersburg.

‘The radioactivity is so powerful’

In fact, apart from the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, Ukraine has three operating power stations – as well as the shutdown Chornobyl facility, the site of one of the world’s worst nuclear disasters.

“And what prevents us from mirroring [Ukraine’s alleged actions] in response? Let them think about it,” Putin said.

His threat had apparently already been fulfilled a day earlier. Ukraine accused Russia of shelling that damaged the power supply to the colossal protective “sarcophagus” over the Chornobyl station’s Reactor Four that exploded in 1986.

Both the Chornobyl station and the plant in Zaporizhzhia need electricity for their safety systems and, most importantly, for the uninterrupted circulation of water that cools nuclear fuel.

The fuel, thousands of uranium rods that keep emitting heat, are too radioactive to be taken anywhere else.

In Chornobyl, the fuel is spent and submerged in cooling ponds or “dry-stored” in ventilated, secured facilities.

But at the Zaporizhzhia site, the rods are still inside the reactors – and are newer, hotter, and made in the United States.

Before the war, Ukraine began a switch from the hexagonal, bee-cell-like rods made by Rosatom, Russia’s nuclear monopoly, to the square rods made by Westinghouse, an energy giant based in Pittsburgh in the US.

The US-made rods will take years to cool down enough to be removed without the risk of contamination, according to a former Zaporizhzhia plant engineer who fled to Kyiv.

“The radioactivity is so powerful that one can’t get the fuel out, [or] transport or handle in other ways until it burns out. It will take years,” the engineer told Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity because of security concerns for relatives in Enerhodar.

Ukrainian forces ‘prevent’ Russia’s alleged plans

A greater challenge at the plant is a severe lack of reactor-cooling water. The Zaporizhzhia station stood less than 15km (9 miles) upstream from the mammoth, Soviet-designed Novo-Kakhovka dam on the Dnieper River.

The dam created a reservoir with up to 18 cubic kilometres (4.76 trillion gallons) of water that freely flowed to the power station. In June 2023, the dam was destroyed by powerful blasts – Ukraine and Russian traded blame – and the water level dropped dramatically.

The deep cooling ponds around the plant that never froze, even in the harshest winters, had been filled to the brim, but the water keeps evaporating. There is enough to cool the shutdown reactors – but not nearly enough if the station is restarted and the uranium rods turn the water into steam to power the turbines.

“It’s absolutely impossible to switch on even one bloc,” the engineer said. “Of course, the Russians keep digging and supply some water, but it’s not enough at all.”

The biggest problem is Russia’s failure to hook the plant to the energy grid of occupied regions as Ukrainian forces pin-pointedly destroy the transmission lines Russia is building – along with fuel depots and thermal power stations, he said.

“The Russians are restoring them any way they can, but Ukrainian forces very much prevent the restoration,” the engineer quipped.

Bellona, a Norway-based nuclear monitor, said on October 2 that a “greater danger lies in Moscow’s potential use of the crisis to justify reconnecting the plant to its own grid – portraying itself as the saviour preventing a nuclear disaster”.

Should Moscow do that, the step would only “worsen [the] strategic situation, give Moscow additional leverage, and bring a potential restart closer – a move that, amid ongoing fighting, would itself sharply increase the risk of a nuclear accident,” it said.

Analysts pointed to a deal proposed by US President Donald Trump in March to transfer the plant to US management as a possible solution.

Ukrainian strikes “will go on until Russia makes a peace deal that also includes US control over the ZAES and its operation”, Nikolay Mitrokhin, a researcher with Germany’s University of Bremen, told Al Jazeera.

Meanwhile, in recent weeks, blackouts in Crimea have become unpredictable and distressing, a Crimea local told Al Jazeera.

“They switch the power off and switch it back on without any warning. Then again – on and off, on and off. My fridge died,” said a resident of Simferopol, Crimea’s administrative capital, on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety.

Russia understands that improved power supply is a prerequisite for its efforts to restore occupied Ukrainian regions and conquer more Ukrainian land, said an observer.

Moscow needs the plant to “cover the growing [energy] consumption in the region, considering not just occupied Crimea, but also the occupied areas [above the Sea of] Azov. And also within the context of Russia’s plan to occupy part of the Zaporizhia region,” Kyiv-based analyst Aleksey Kushch told Al Jazeera.

Greenpeace said that its detailed analysis of high-resolution satellite images taken after what Putin alleged were Ukrainian strikes showed that he was bluffing.

“There is no evidence of any military strikes in the area surrounding the pylons and network of power lines in this part of Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant,” the international environmentalist group said on October 1.

The images showed that the power towers remained in position and there were no craters left by explosions around the lines, it said.

Greenpeace concluded that the blackout at the plant is “a deliberate act of sabotage by Russia” whose aim is to “permanently disconnect the plant from the Ukraine grid and connect the nuclear plant to the grid occupied by Russia”.

Displacement has surged in el-Fasher as paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) intensified attacks on North Darfur’s capital, according to a United Nations report.

More than one million people have fled el-Fasher since the start of Sudan’s civil war, with the exodus dramatically accelerating as the RSF has increased attacks following its loss of control of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, earlier this year, according to data published by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) on Sunday.

The number of internally displaced people (IDP) sheltering in el-Fasher plummeted 70 percent, from approximately 699,000 to 204,000, between March and September, the IOM’s Displacement Tracking Matrix says.

El-Fasher’s overall population has now shrunk by 62 percent from its pre-war level of 1.11 million to just 413,454 people.

Sharp decline

The sharp decline follows the recapture of Khartoum by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) in late March, after which the RSF pivoted to consolidating control over Darfur. El-Fasher represents the army’s last major urban stronghold.

April has been one of the most violent months this year, with nearly 500,000 people – representing almost all of the camp’s population – displaced from Zamzam IDP camp in a single incident.

The Sudanese army has been battling the RSF for control of the country since April 2023, triggering what has widely been described as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.

Millions have fled to neighbouring countries, with Egypt and Chad absorbing the majority.

Cross-border movement into Chad surged by 45 percent year-on-year in 2025, reaching nearly 1.2 million people.

Those who are unable to leave the country have been internally displaced to surrounding areas. The IDP population in the nearby Tawila locality more than doubled from 238,000 to 576,000 between March and September.

The RSF has maintained a siege of el-Fasher since May 2024, cutting off supply routes and trapping an estimated 260,000 civilians, including 130,000 children, without sustained humanitarian access for more than 16 months.

The Yale Humanitarian Lab, which has been monitoring the war, published satellite imagery which it said showed earthen berms built by the RSF almost encircling the city, helping to enforce the siege and preventing the movement of supplies and people.

Recent weeks have seen escalating violence. A September drone attack on a mosque during Friday prayers killed more than 70 worshippers, prompting the UN to raise the alarm about the possibility of “ethnically motivated” killings if the city falls to the RSF.

The RSF has been widely reported to have targeted non-Arab populations across Darfur, with their fighters frequently filming themselves shouting racial slurs at their victims.

In early September, UN investigators accused both sides of committing atrocities. They said the RSF is committing “murder, torture, enslavement, rape, sexual slavery, sexual violence, forced displacement and persecution on ethnic, gender and political grounds”.

Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation continues to worsen.

Among households surveyed in August, 87 percent reported needing healthcare, but 78 percent were unable to access treatment due to destroyed facilities, insecurity, and lack of medicine.

Food security has deteriorated sharply, with 89 percent of households facing poor or borderline food consumption.

Since the siege began, more than 1,100 grave violations against children have been verified in el-Fasher, including over 1,000 children killed or maimed, according to UNICEF.

The battle for el-Fasher has become central to the broader war’s trajectory.

Key city

The RSF controls most of western Sudan, including nearly all of Darfur, while government forces hold the north and the east.

In July, the RSF and its allies announced a widely condemned “parallel government” in the country, underlining the deep political divide which has become more entrenched in the country.

El-Fasher’s potential fall would give the paramilitary force control over virtually the entire Darfur region.

Here are the key events from day 1,320 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, October 6, 2025:

Fighting

• A Russian attack killed a family of four, including a 15-year-old girl, in the village of Lapaivka in Ukraine’s Lviv region, the regional prosecutor’s office reported in a post on Facebook.
• The attack on the region in Ukraine’s west, far from the Russian border, also injured several people and targeted gas infrastructure used for heating during a cold snap, the regional administrator’s office wrote in a post on Telegram.
• One person was killed and 10 others injured as Russian forces launched 702 attacks on 18 settlements in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia region in a day, Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov wrote on Telegram.
• The attacks left at least 73,000 people without power, with service restored to most people by early afternoon, Fedorov added.
• Russia’s Ministry of Defence claimed on Sunday its forces had hit Ukrainian military-industrial facilities as well as gas and energy infrastructure overnight.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote in a post on Facebook that Russian forces launched more than 50 missiles and about 500 attack drones at Ukraine overnight into Sunday, targeting the Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zaporizhia, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odesa and Kirovohrad regions.
• Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s Belgorod region left some 40,000 people without power, Regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote in a post on Telegram.
• Three people were also injured in Ukrainian attacks on Belgorod, Russia’s TASS state news agency reported.
• Russian forces shot down four Ukrainian guided aerial bombs and 145 drones in a 24-hour period, TASS reported.

Politics and Diplomacy

• In response to a question from reporters about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s offer last month to voluntarily maintain limits on deployed strategic nuclear weapons, United States President Donald Trump said, “Sounds like a good idea to me.”
• German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius warned Europe must be wary of falling into “Putin’s escalation trap” while also strengthening anti-drone defences, amid drone sightings near airports across Europe.
• Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said that “specific people from abroad … expressed direct support … for the announced attempt to overthrow [Moldova’s] constitutional order,” naming the European Union ambassador to Georgia, the day after protesters sought to force their way into the presidential palace.
• German Chancellor Friedrich Merz informed Trump about plans to use frozen Russian assets to support Ukrainian armed forces in a phone call on Sunday.
• The Reuters news agency reported that Trump administration diplomats are planning to accuse Cuba of providing up to 5,000 fighters to support Moscow’s war on Ukraine, in a bid to limit support for lifting the decades-long US embargo on Cuba. Cuban authorities previously arrested 17 people on charges related to a human trafficking ring that allegedly lured young Cuban men to fight in Ukraine with the Russian military.

Weapons

• Putin said that if the US supplies Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine for long-range strikes deep into Russia, it would “lead to the destruction of our relations, or at least the positive trends that have emerged in these relations”, in a video released by Russian state television reporter, Pavel Zarubin, on Sunday.
• In a post on X, Zelenskyy said that Russian weapons used to attack Ukraine include components made by companies from many places, including “the United States, China, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and the Netherlands”.

Five people have been killed in Ukraine after Russia launched hundreds of drones and missiles across the country overnight, which officials said targeted civilian infrastructure.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Sunday that Russia fired approximately 50 missiles and 500 attack drones.

“The Russians struck with cruise missiles, Shaheds and Kinzhals among other things,” he said. “The Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Zaporizhzhia, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Odesa, and Kirovohrad regions were all targeted.”

One person in the eastern city of Zaporizhzhia and four members of a family in Lviv were killed in the attack. One of those killed was a 15-year-old girl.

Lviv’s mayor, Andriy Sadovyi, said that the city was left without power and that public transport was affected. Sadovyi warned residents of the city not to go outside, citing smoke and several ongoing fires.

Mykola Dmytrotsa, a resident of Lapaivka village just outside Lviv, said his house was struck.

“All windows were blown out, doors and everything inside, too. What else can I tell you? I do not even want to talk about it. No doors, no windows, no roof,” he told the Reuters news agency.

Volodymyr Hutnyk, a local official, said: “In this area, 10 private homes were damaged so severely that they are no longer habitable. They will need to be dismantled and rebuilt. Many other houses have shattered windows and doors, and their roofs have been damaged.”

Lviv is near Ukraine’s border with Poland and has generally avoided the worst of Russia’s attacks.

Maksym Kozytskyi, the governor of Lviv region, said it was the largest attack the region had experienced throughout the war, which has lasted more than three years.

“Across all affected areas, residential buildings and critical infrastructure were damaged,” Ukraine’s Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said. “Moscow continues to strike homes, schools, and energy facilities – proving that destruction remains its only strategy.”

“Ukraine was shattered by explosions last night,” said Kira Rudik, a member of Ukraine’s parliament. “Every one of these tragedies could have been prevented if Russia had been stopped.”

At least 30 people were killed on a passenger train in Sumy due to a Russian strike on Saturday, which Ukraine’s president said was “savage”.

Poland scrambles jets

Poland said it mobilised its fighter jets along with NATO allies to respond to the strike, which the Polish air force said was “preventive in nature” and “aimed at securing the airspace and protecting citizens”.

Around 20 Russian drones entered Polish airspace in early September, raising concerns about the possible spillover of Russia’s attacks onto Polish and NATO territory. Russia has also been accused in recent weeks of violating the airspace of other NATO members, including Norway, Estonia, Lithuania and Denmark.

Belgium on Friday said 15 drones were spotted flying over a military base in the country’s east. Its Defence Minister Theo Francken said there was no evidence linking Moscow directly, but added, “Personally, I think those drones are often an example of hybrid threats. This is a way to sow unrest. That has been Russia’s pattern for many years.”

Russia has denied responsibility for many of the attacks, with President Vladimir Putin mocking countries claiming Russia was behind the drone attacks over the weekend.

On Saturday, Denmark said Russian naval vessels had tracked Danish ships, sailed on collision courses, tracked aircraft with their radars and pointed their weapons. “Russia is using military means, including in an aggressive way, to put pressure on us without crossing the line into armed conflict in a traditional sense,” Danish intelligence director Thomas Ahrenkiel said.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said Russia is “masking its failed summer offensive with terror attacks on Ukrainian civilians and infrastructure”. Kallas said the EU was prepared to back Kyiv for “as long as needed” and said a new sanctions package was being prepared.

Lithuania’s foreign minister, Kestutis Budrys, joined Zelenskyy after the attack in calling on countries around the world to stop purchasing Russian energy, which they said fuels Moscow’s war machine.

“We must stop feeding its imperial appetite and put an end to state terrorism,” Budrys posted on X.

These incidents come as Europe has hardened its position on Russia, announcing new sanctions, the possibility of using Russian money for Ukraine and purchasing NATO arms for Kyiv, while the US has warmed to the Kremlin.

Samuel Ramani, a fellow at the United Kingdom-based defence think-tank RUSI, said Russia is retaliating for Europe taking a “sharply” pro-Ukraine position in recent months.

Russia sees Europe as a more “incorrigible adversary, whereas with the Americans, we can still find a way back, a way to do business with them and work with them,” Ramani told Al Jazeera.

“As a result, the Russians are using a variety of tactics like GPS jamming, drones, hot air balloons as we have seen with Lithuania, to signal their discontent.”

Warsaw says ground-based air defence, radar reconnaissance systems also brought to the ‘highest state of readiness’.

Polish and allied air defences have been deployed to secure the country’s airspace, its military said, as Russia launched new deadly air strikes on neighbouring Ukraine.

The latest deployment on Sunday comes as the transatlantic security bloc NATO steps up its air patrols across the region in response to suspected Russian airspace incursions and drone sightings in several member states.

“Polish and allied aircraft are operating in our airspace, while ground-based air defence and radar reconnaissance systems have been brought to the highest state of readiness,” Poland’s operational command said in a post on X early on Sunday.

“These actions are preventive in nature and are aimed at securing the airspace and protecting citizens, especially in areas adjacent to the threatened region,” the statement added.

The Polish military said it is monitoring the current situation, stating that its forces under its command “remain fully prepared for immediate response”.

Poland shares an estimated 530km (329 miles) with Ukraine.

As of 02:10 GMT, all of Ukraine was under air raid alerts following Ukrainian Air Force warnings of Russian missile and drone attacks.

In a statement posted on Telegram, Ivan Fedorov, head of the southeastern Zapoprizhia region, said that a Russian “combined strike” killed a woman and wounded six other people, including a 16-year-old girl.

In late September, Poland was forced to briefly close part of its airspace southeast of the capital, Warsaw, after Russia launched a major attack across Ukraine.

Earlier that month, Polish and NATO forces also intercepted Russian drones which entered Poland’s airspace, marking their first direct military engagement with Moscow since the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022.

On Sunday, NATO member Lithuania reopened its main airport after shutting it for hours following sightings of a “series of balloons” in its airspace.

Airports in Germany, Denmark, Norway and Poland have also recently suspended flights due to unidentified drones, while Romania and Estonia have pointed the finger at Russia, which has dismissed the allegations.

Here are the key events from day 1,319 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Sunday, October 5, 2025:

Fighting

• One person was killed and about 30 others injured after two Russian drones struck trains at a station in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of “terrorism”, while Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Moscow deliberately targeted civilians during the attack.

• French photojournalist Antoni Lallican was killed, while his Ukrainian colleague Hryhory Ivanchenko was injured after a Russian drone attack struck the town of Druzhkivka in the Donbas region, one of the front lines of the three-and-a-half-year war, the Ukrainian military said.

• Russia has launched its most significant attack on Ukraine’s main gas production facilities in Kharkiv and Poltava regions, launching 35 missiles and 60 drones, according to Naftogaz CEO Sergii Koretskyi. The attack came as Ukraine prepares for a new heating season.

Regional security

• Danish Defence Intelligence Service director, Thomas Ahrenkiel, has accused Russia of risking unintended escalation, with its warships repeatedly sailing on collision courses with Danish naval vessels, aiming weapons and disrupting navigation systems in Denmark’s straits that connect the Baltic Sea to the North Sea.
• Germany’s Bild newspaper is reporting that drones have been spotted at airports and military installations across Germany over two days. The second drone sighting in two days has forced dozens of flights to be diverted or cancelled at Munich airport, although operations have resumed with delays by Saturday morning.

Politics and diplomacy

• International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi has called on Russia and Ukraine to show the “political will” required to keep the area around the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant safe to allow the external power line to be reconnected to the facility. The facility has been cut off from external power since September 23, making it more complicated to cool the reactors, while compromising nuclear safety.

• A senior Ukrainian intelligence official has accused China of passing on satellite intelligence to Russia to enable Moscow to better launch missile strikes inside Ukraine. Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Agency official Oleh Alexandrov told the state Ukrinform news agency that “there is evidence of high-level cooperation” between Moscow and Beijing in conducting satellite reconnaissance.
• The International Civil Aviation Organization has rebuked Russia for disturbances to critical satellite navigation systems that they say violate international rules, as the United Nations aviation agency’s assembly concluded in Canada. Estonia and Finland have accused Russia of jamming GPS navigation devices in the region’s airspace, charges that Moscow has denied.

Negotiations are due to begin in Cairo, which US President Donald Trump says may bring an end to Israel’s war on the Gaza Strip.

Hamas has partially agreed to Trump’s plan to end the war, but with major caveats.

So has Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

But the details have yet to be agreed upon, including how Israeli forces withdraw and who will govern the Strip after the war ends.

So, is it possible to draw up a plan that all sides can agree to?

What would an interim government look like?

And what does all of this mean for the Palestinian people?

Presenter: Dareen Abughaida

Guests:

Mouin Rabbani – Researcher, Analyst and Co-Editor of Jadaliyya

Yossi Mekelberg – Political Analyst and Senior Consulting Fellow at Chatham House.

Muhammad Shehada – Analyst and Senior Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations