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Sydney — Australia, Japan, and the United States are expanding defense cooperation. Analysts say the moves are a response to China's growing military assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region. Senior Australian and Japanese officials Thursday met for the 11th Australia-Japan 2+2 Foreign and Defense Ministerial Consultation in the state of Victoria. Australia’s deputy prime minister and minister for defense, Richard Marles, told reporters that plans were agreed for Japan to join U.S. Marine rotations in northern Australia, as well as more joint exercises and fighter jet deployments. “The relationship between our two countries really has gone to a very different level. Today we have agreed to enhance our air engagement with greater people-to-people links, more training, greater exercises between our two air forces,” he said. Long-standing territorial disputes and differences over Taiwan have unsettled Japan’s relations with China. China overtook Japan as the world’s second-largest economy in 2010 and analysts have said that greater economic prosperity in China has been accompanied by more aggressive military posturing. The bilateral talks in Victoria came after two Chinese incursions into Japanese territory. A Chinese surveillance plane breached Japanese airspace on August 26, while a survey ship entered Japan's territorial waters a few days later. Japanese Foreign Minister Kamikawa Yoko told reporters that closer ties with Australia are essential. “Amidst the increasingly difficult security environment in the Indo-Pacific, we need to raise the Japan-Australia security cooperation to a new height,” said Yoko. Under the plans, Japanese troops could join up to 2,500 U.S. Marines who train in Australia’s Northern Territory each year. Japan and Australia could also collaborate on their long-range missile systems. There has been no response, so far, from Beijing to these strategic plans. Japan was an enemy of Australia and the United States in World War II, but Euan Graham a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a research organization funded by the Australian and other governments, said on social media the proposals show “at a symbolic level how successfully Australia and Japan have put wartime memories behind them.” Australia’s formal military ties with Washington date to the early 1950s and are considered by successive governments in Canberra to the cornerstone of Australia’s sense of security in an increasingly fractious region.

Beijing — China's years of splashing cash on big-ticket infrastructure projects in Africa may be over, analysts say, with Beijing seeking to shield itself from risky, indebted partners on the continent as it grapples with a slowing economy at home.    Beijing for years dished out billions in loans for trains, roads and bridges in Africa that saddled participating governments with debts they often struggled to pay back.    But experts say it is now opting for smaller loans to fund more modest development projects.    "China has adjusted its lending strategy in Africa to take China's own domestic economic troubles and Africa's debt problems into account," Lucas Engel, a data analyst studying Chinese development finance at the Boston University Global Development Policy Center, said.    "This new prudence and risk aversion among Chinese lenders is intended to ensure that China can continue to engage with Africa in a more resilient and sustainable manner," he told AFP.    "The large infrastructure loans China was known for in the past have become rarer."      As African leaders gathered this week for Beijing's biggest summit since the pandemic, President Xi Jinping committed more than $50 billion in financing over the next three years.    More than half of that would be in credit, Xi said, while the rest would come from unspecified "various types of assistance" and $10 billion through encouraging Chinese firms to invest.    Xi gave no details on how those funds would be dished out.    Loans redirected  China has for years pumped vast sums of cash into African nations as it looks to shore up access to crucial resources, while also using its influence as a geopolitical tool amid ongoing tensions with the West.    But while Beijing lauds its largesse towards the continent, data shows China's funding has dwindled dramatically in recent years.    Chinese lenders supplied a total of $4.6 billion to eight African countries and two regional financial institutions last year, according to Boston University research.    The key shift concerns those on the receiving end: more than half of the total amount went to multilateral or nationally owned banks — compared with just five percent between 2000 and 2022.    And although last year's loans to Africa were the highest since 2019, they were less than a quarter of what was dished out at the peak of nearly $29 billion eight years ago.    "Redirecting loans to African multilateral borrowers allows Chinese lenders to engage with entities with high credit ratings, not struggling individual sovereign borrowers," Engel said.    "These loans reach private borrowers in ailing African countries in which African multilateral banks operate."  Modest approach   China coordinates much of its overseas lending under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the massive infrastructure project that is a central pillar of Xi's bid to expand his country's clout overseas.    The BRI made headlines for backing big-ticket projects in Africa with opaque funding and questionable impacts.    But China has been shifting its approach in the past few years, analysts said.    It has increasingly funneled money into smaller projects, from a modestly sized solar farm in Burkina Faso to a hydropower project in Madagascar and broadband infrastructure in Angola, according to Boston University's researchers.    "The increased volume of loans signals Africa's continued importance to China, but the type of loans being deployed are intended to let Africans know that China is taking African concerns into account," Engel told AFP.    This does not mean that Beijing is "permanently retrenching its investments and provision of development finance to the continent," Zainab Usman, director of the Africa Program at the US-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said.    "Development finance flows, especially lending, (are) now starting to rebound," she said.     No 'debt traps'   African leaders have this week secured deals with China on a range of sectors including infrastructure, agriculture, mining and energy.    Western critics accuse China of using the BRI to enmesh developing nations in unsustainable debt to exert diplomatic leverage over them or even seize their assets.    A chorus of African leaders — as well as research by leading global think tanks like London's Chatham House — have rebuked the "debt trap" theory.    "I don't necessarily buy in the notion that when China invests, it is with an intention of... ensuring that those countries end up in a debt trap," South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said in Beijing on Thursday.    One analyst agreed, saying that for many Africans, China has "become synonymous" with life-changing roads, bridges and ports and the debt-trap argument ignores the "positive impact" Beijing has had on infrastructure development on the continent.    "The reality is some [African] countries have had a tough time fulfilling their debt repayment commitments due to a multiplicity of factors," Ovigwe Eguegu, a policy analyst at consultancy Development Reimagined, said.    Engel, of the Boston University research center, said the argument mistakenly assumes that "China solely has short-term objectives in Africa."    That, he said, "vastly underestimates [its] long-term vision... to shape a system of global governance that will be favorable to its rise." 

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

RAMSTEIN AIR BASE, Germany — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met Friday with top United States military leaders and more than 50 partner nations in Germany to press for more weapons support as Washington announced it would provide another $250 million in security assistance to Kyiv. U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the meeting of the leaders was taking place during a dynamic moment in Ukraine’s fight against Russia, as it conducts its first offensive operations of the war while facing a significant threat from Russian forces near a key hub in the Donbas. So far, the surprise assault inside Russia’s Kursk territory has not drawn away President Vladimir Putin’s focus from taking the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, which provides critical rail and supply links for the Ukrainian army. Losing Pokrovsk could put additional Ukrainian cities at risk. While Kursk has put Russia on the defensive, “we know Putin’s malice runs deep,” Austin cautioned in prepared remarks to the media before the Ukraine Defense Contact Group met. Moscow is pressing on, especially around Pokrovsk, Austin said. Recent deadly airstrikes by Russia have renewed Zelenskyy’s calls for the U.S. to further loosen restrictions and obtain even greater Western capabilities to strike deeper inside Russia. However, the meeting Friday was expected to focus on resourcing more air defense and artillery supplies and shoring up gains on expanding Ukraine’s own defense industrial base, to put it on more solid footing as the final days of Joe Biden's U.S. presidency wind down. Zelenskyy said he would continue to press for the long-range strike capability. “Strong long-range decisions by partners are needed to bring the just peace we seek closer,” Zelenskyy said Friday on Telegram. Western partner nations were working with Ukraine to source a substitute missile for its Soviet-era S-300 air defense systems, Austin said. The U.S. is also focused on resourcing a variety of air-to-ground missiles that the newly delivered F-16 fighter jets can carry, including the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile, which could give Ukraine a longer-range cruise missile option, said Bill LaPlante, the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer, who spoke to reporters traveling with Austin. No decisions on the munition have been made, LaPlante said, noting that policymakers would still have to decide whether to give Ukraine the longer-range capability. “I would just put JASSM in that category, it’s something that is always being looked at,” LaPlante said. “Anything that’s an air-to-ground weapon is always being looked at.” For the past two years, members of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group have met to resource Ukraine’s mammoth artillery and air defense needs, ranging from hundreds of millions of rounds of small arms ammunition to some of the West’s most sophisticated air defense systems, and now fighter jets. The ask this month was more of the same — but different in that it was in person, and followed a similar in-person visit Thursday in Kyiv by Biden's Deputy National Security Advisor Jon Finer as Zelenskyy shores up U.S. support before the administration changes. Since 2022, the member nations together have provided about $106 billion in security assistance to Ukraine. The U.S. has provided more than $56 billion of that total. The German government said Chancellor Olaf Scholz plans to meet Zelenskyy in Frankfurt on Friday afternoon.

Melbourne, Australia — Pope Francis’s visit to Papua New Guinea will take him to a remote part of the South Pacific island nation where Christianity is a recent addition to traditional spiritual beliefs developed over millennia. Francis will visit the diocese of Vanimo on the main island of New Guinea, one of the most remote and disadvantaged in a poor and diverse nation, according to local Bishop Francis Meli. Trappings of modernity are scarce. There is no running water for the more than 120,000 people who live in the diocese, according to a church website. Electricity is a luxury for the few who can afford solar panels or portable generators. The visit is an extraordinary religious highlight in an area where Christian missionaries did not arrive until 1961, and where the religion coexists with traditional ancestor worship, animism and sorcery. The pope will meet around a dozen missionary nuns and priests from his native Argentina during his visit scheduled for Sept. 8. He will also inspect a church-built high school and crisis center for abused women and girls. Argentinian missionary Tomas Ravaioli, a priest of the Institute of the Incarnate Word, said he came to the Vanimo Diocese 14 years ago after his superiors told him there was “a big need for priests.” While Christian churches are full, Indigenous “customs and traditions are very much rooted,” Ravaioli said. “Sometimes for people, it’s not easy to live Christianity 100% because they have traditions that are pagan,” Ravaioli said. “But honestly, I think Christianity here in Papua New Guinea is very, very strong,” he added. Papua New Guinea is an overwhelmingly Christian country — a 2000 census showed 96% of the population identified with the religion — but the spiritual beliefs that developed during 50,000 years of human habitation remain part of the fabric of the nation’s culture. Michael Mel is a 65-year-old academic who was baptized as a baby by one of the first missionaries to reach his village in the remote highlands. An Indigenous man, he said he also “aligns” with traditional spirituality and cautions against abandoning Indigenous culture. “Western civilization is great. The West has brought us reading and writing and technology and all of the rest of it, but there are some things where I think our sensibilities were much, much better,” Mel said, giving Indigenous forest care as an example. Mining has widened the country’s economic divide and pitted the haves against the have-nots. “We need to balance ourselves. We cannot just gung ho throw our knowledge away and accept Western civilization completely,” Mel said. But traditional beliefs can also contribute to the deadly tribal violence that is creating an unprecedented internal security threat across the country, especially allegations of witchcraft, known in local languages as sanguma. Sorcery allegations typically arise in reaction to unexpected deaths or illness. But some suspect they also reflect jealousies and rivalries arising from major societal changes in recent decades that have more to do with rapid modernization and uneven development than religion. As traditional bows and arrows are being replaced by more lethal assault rifles, the toll of fighting is getting deadlier, and police fear that they are outgunned. Mercenaries are also now a feature of what were once conflicts limited to tribal rivals. “Even though they believe in God and they believe in Jesus Christ, ... they fear witchcraft,” said Bishop Meli, who was born east of Vanimo on an island off New Britain. Authorities don’t condone the persecution of supposed witches. Parliament in 2013 repealed the Sorcery Act which had made an accusation of sorcery a partial defense against a murder charge. But a study has found that prosecutions for violence against accused sorcerers remain rare compared to how commonplace witch hunts are. Another enduring source of conflict is land ownership. Almost all the land in Papua New Guinea is customarily owned, which means it belongs to a distinct tribe or group instead of individuals. With no clear borders between customary lands, territorial disputes regularly lead to violence. Both were among the complex combination of causes blamed for a massacre in East Sepik province, east of Vanimo, on July 17 when 30 men armed with guns, axes, spears, knives and sling shots launching sharpened steel rods killed at least 26 villagers. Four weeks later, police reported a single suspect had been arrested. They remained hopeful that the rest of the culprits would be found. The U.N. children agency UNICEF said 395 survivors of the attack, including 220 children, remained homeless more than a month later because their houses were torched. Meli said tribal violence was not a problem in his diocese, where he described the population as “friendly and peaceful.” Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape relished the attention the papal visit would bring his country, noting that 80 members of the international media had registered to travel there for the event. Marape said South Pacific leaders he met at the Pacific Islands Forum on Tonga in late August had proposed sending delegations to meet the pontiff. He also noted that Catholics were the largest Christian denomination in Papua New Guinea. Catholics accounted for 26% of the population, according to a 2011 census. "We look forward to the visit,” Marape told The Associated Press at the Tongan capital, Nuku’alofa. The Vatican is highlighting Papua New Guinea on the international stage at a time the United States and China struggle over the former World War II battleground for strategic influence. The United States and close ally Australia, concerned by China’s growing influence in the South Pacific, have struck new security agreements with Papua New Guinea. Australia’s latest pact addresses Port Moresby’s concerns about deteriorating internal security problems. China is also reportedly pursuing a bilateral policing pact with Papua New Guinea. The Vatican. meanwhile, has been working for years to try to improve relations with China that were officially severed over seven decades ago when the Communists came to power. A renewed agreement between China and the Vatican on the appointment of Chinese bishops is expected to be signed in October. Bishop Meli said the faithful in his diocese were amazed that they would be included in the itinerary of the first visit by a pontiff to Papua New Guinea since Pope John Paul II in 1995. “They are so excited and people are full of jubilation and joy because this is historic,” Meli said. “They don’t think any pope in history will be able to come again to Vanimo,” he said.

Caracas, Venezuela — A U.S. Navy sailor held in Venezuela since late last month was arrested for entering "without any type of document," the South American country's attorney general said Thursday. An American official on Wednesday announced the sailor had been detained at a time of soaring tensions between Washington and Caracas in the aftermath of disputed elections in Venezuela, with the opposition party claiming it can prove were stolen. In his first comments on the matter, Venezuelan Attorney General Tarek William Saab said the sailor "entered without any type of document, without any means of subsistence for what he came to do in the country." He said the sailor held dual U.S. and Mexican nationalities. For its part, the Pentagon said the sailor had been in Venezuela on "personal travel." "This wasn't something that was authorized," Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told reporters. "The U.S. Navy is looking into this. We're working with the State Department," she said, adding that: "Of course, we'd like to see the sailor returned home." Venezuela was rocked by protests after President Nicolas Maduro was declared the winner of a disputed July 28 election, with 25 civilians and two soldiers killed and more than 2,400 people arrested. The opposition claims it won by a landslide, and the United States, the European Union and several Latin American countries have refused to recognize Maduro's claimed victory without seeing detailed voting results. On Monday, Washington seized Maduro's plane in the Dominican Republic and flew it to Florida, a move the Venezuelan leader condemned as "piracy" but which Washington said was necessary due to sanctions violations. The following day, Washington denounced an arrest warrant issued for opposition presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia and warned of further action against Maduro. The U.S. State Department has warned Americans against traveling to Venezuela for reasons including crime, unrest and wrongful detention.

GENEVA — Flagrant rights violations by Sudan's warring parties require the deployment of an "independent and impartial force" to protect millions of civilians driven from their homes, UN experts said Friday. An independent fact-finding mission uncovered "harrowing" violations by both sides since April last year "which may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity," they said. The conflict pits the national army led by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan against the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces of his former deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Daglo. It has triggered one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. Tens of thousands of people have been killed, and the experts said 8 million civilians have been displaced while a further 2 million people have fled to neighboring countries. Mohamed Chande Othman, chair of the fact-finding mission, created late last year, called for "urgent and immediate action to protect civilians." "Given the failure of the warring parties to spare civilians, it is imperative that an independent and impartial force with a mandate to safeguard civilians be deployed without delay," Othman said. The mission found evidence of "indiscriminate" airstrikes and shelling against civilian targets including schools and hospitals as well as water and electricity supplies. "The warring parties also targeted civilians... through rape and other forms of sexual violence, arbitrary arrest and detention, as well as torture and ill-treatment," the mission said. "These violations may amount to war crimes." 'Wake-up call' In August, the United States convened talks in Geneva aimed at ending the brutal war, achieving progress on aid access but not a cease-fire. It also announced visa sanctions on an unspecified number of individuals in South Sudan, including government officials, accused of obstructing the delivery of humanitarian aid for 25 million Sudanese facing severe hunger. The U.N.-mandated experts based their findings on testimony from dozens of survivors of the fighting now in Chad, Kenya and Uganda — but not in Sudan, where authorities failed to respond to four requests to visit. Sudan's government also declined to comment officially on the mission's findings. Its report "should serve as a wake-up call to the international community to take decisive action to support survivors, their families and affected communities, and hold perpetrators accountable," Mona Rishmawi, a member of the mission, said in a statement.

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HONG KONG — Southern China's Hainan province evacuated over 400,000 people ahead of the expected landfall on Friday of Super Typhoon Yagi, while tens of thousands prepared to seek shelter in neighboring Vietnam from what is set to be the strongest storm to hit the region in over a decade. Yagi killed at least 13 people in the Philippines earlier this week when it was still classified as a tropical storm, triggering floods and landslides on the country's main island of Luzon before strengthening into a super typhoon over the past few days. The storm was expected to make landfall in China later on Friday along the coasts of Hainan, a popular holiday destination, and neighboring Guangdong province, the state-run Xinhua news agency said, citing authorities. The ministry of water resources on Thursday raised its emergency response to flooding in both provinces to the third-highest tier. "Yagi is likely to be the strongest typhoon to hit China's southern coast since 2014, making flood and prevention work very challenging," Xinhua said, citing a meeting held by flood officials. Authorities in Hainan have evacuated over 400,000 people on the island, the news agency said, citing local authorities. Packing wind speeds of more than 240 kilometers per hour, the typhoon "is equivalent to a Category 4 hurricane," according to NASA Earth Data. In Hong Kong, a typhoon warning that had been in effect was lowered shortly after noon following heavy rains overnight as Yagi passed within 400 kilometers of the city. Trading at Hong Kong's stock exchange was suspended on Friday, and day schools were closed. Authorities said five people were injured in the city due to the weather, but damage was limited.   Southern China is frequently hit during the summer and autumn by typhoons that form in the warm oceans east of the Philippines and then travel west. But climate change has made tropical storms more unpredictable while increasing their intensity, leading to heavy rains and violent gusts that cause flash floods and coastal damage, experts say. After moving through southern China, Yagi will head towards Vietnam, on course to hit the northern and north-central regions around the famed UNESCO heritage site Halong Bay on Saturday. Tens of thousands of people will be evacuated to safer areas in Hai Phong and Thai Binh provinces on Friday, local authorities said. "This will be the strongest typhoon (to hit northern Vietnam) in 20 years," said Pham Duc Luan, head of the dyke management authority on Thursday. More than 457,000 military personnel have been mobilized by the relief and rescue department of the defense ministry. Officials have also directed 50,000 fishing vessels carrying 220,000 people to take shelter.

NEW DELHI — India's main opposition Congress party this week set up a new internal group to promote LGBTQ+ rights while another party has named a person from the community as its spokesperson, in the first such political recognition after many setbacks. The country's top court in 2018 decriminalized homosexuality but greatly disappointed the LGBTQ+ community last year when it declined to legalize same-sex marriage and left it to parliament to decide. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has also said the legislature is the right platform to rule on the contentious issue, and this week invited the public to share views on how best to ensure that policies for the community are inclusive and effective. Same-sex relations are mostly a taboo in the largely conservative country of 1.42 billion people, and the government told the Supreme Court last year that such marriages were not "comparable with the Indian family unit concept of a husband, a wife and children". Congress, whose political clout has risen after doing much better than expected in the April-June general election, this week named LGBTQ+ activist Mario da Penha as the head of its new unit for the community under its All India Professionals’ Congress division. This follows Congress's poll promise to bring in a law to legalize civil unions between same-sex couples. Da Penha said on X it was the "only representative framework for queer people within any recognised national political party in India". Anish Gawande, who last month became the first person from the community to become the spokesperson for a big party, the opposition Nationalist Congress Party - Sharadchandra Pawar, said da Penha's appointment was "a major moment for queer inclusion in Indian politics." Gawande earlier said on social media of the Nationalist Congress appointment: "If you'd told me 10 years ago that it would be possible to be out and in Indian politics, I would have scoffed in disbelief." The federal government says it has taken a host of measures for the community, which includes enabling same-sex couples to access government food programs as families, open joint bank accounts and choose each other as nominees, and seek medical and other care without discrimination. The Department of Social Justice and Empowerment said in a statement on Sunday it had invited inputs from the public to ensure that policies and initiatives for the community are inclusive and effective. It did not mention any law to recognize marriages between same-sex couples. A spokesperson for the ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

BANGKOK — Myanmar military air strikes in northern Shan state killed 11 civilians and wounded 11 more, a spokeswoman for an ethnic minority armed group battling the junta told AFP on Friday. The junta is battling widespread armed opposition to its 2021 coup and its soldiers are accused of bloody rampages and using air and artillery strikes to punish civilian communities. "They bombed at two areas in Namhkam" town on Friday around 1 a.m. local time, Lway Yay Oo of the Ta'ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) said. The strikes killed 11 and wounded 11, she said, adding that the office of a local political party had been damaged. The dead were five men, four women and two children, she said. Namhkam is around 5 kilometers from the border with China's Yunnan province, with TNLA fighters claiming control of the town following weeks of fighting last year. Images on social media showed people sifting through rubble and carrying a young person who appeared to be wounded. One video showed several destroyed buildings. AFP reporters geolocated that video to a site in Namhkam and said it had not appeared online before. AFP was unable to reach a junta spokesman for comment. Since last year the military has lost swaths of territory near the border with China in northern Shan state to an alliance of armed ethnic minority groups and "People's Defense Forces" battling to overturn its coup. The groups have seized a regional military command and taken control of lucrative border trade crossings, prompting rare public criticism by military supporters of the junta's top leadership. Earlier this week junta chief Min Aung Hlaing warned civilians in territory held by ethnic minority armed groups to prepare for military counterattacks, state media reported. The junta also announced this week that it had declared the TNLA a "terrorist" organization. Those found supporting or contacting the TNLA and two other ethnic minority armed groups, the Arakan Army, and Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, can now face legal action. Myanmar has been in turmoil since the military deposed Aung San Suu Kyi's government in 2021 and launched a crackdown that sparked an armed uprising. Conflict since the coup has forced more than 2.7 million people to flee their homes, according to the United Nations.

Gaza Strip, Palestinian Territories — Hamas called on the United States Thursday to "exert real pressure" on Israel to reach a Gaza cease-fire agreement as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there was no deal in the making. The two sides have traded blame over stalling talks for a cease-fire and hostage exchange as Netanyahu faces pressure to seal a deal following the deaths of six Gaza captives. Hamas's Qatar-based lead negotiator Khalil al-Hayya called on the United States to "exert real pressure on Netanyahu and his government" and "abandon their blind bias" towards Israel. But Netanyahu said there is "not a deal in the making." "Unfortunately, it's not close but we will do everything we can to get them to the point where they do make a deal," he told U.S. media. Netanyahu insists that Israel must retain control over the Philadelphi Corridor along the Egypt-Gaza border to prevent weapons smuggling to Hamas, whose Oct. 7 attack on Israel started the war. Hamas is demanding complete Israeli withdrawal from the area and on Thursday said Netanyahu's position "aims to thwart reaching an agreement." The Palestinian militant group says a new deal is unnecessary because they agreed months ago to a truce outlined by Biden. "We warn against falling into the trap of Netanyahu... who uses negotiations to prolong the aggression against our people," Hamas said in a statement. Washington has been pushing a proposal it says could bridge gaps between the warring sides, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken saying "90 percent is agreed." "It's really incumbent on both parties to get to yes on these remaining issues," Blinken said during a visit to Haiti. 'Make them' sign deal At Israeli protests in several cities this week, Netanyahu's critics have blamed him for hostages' deaths, saying he has refused to make necessary concessions for striking a cease-fire deal. "We'll do everything so that all hostages will be with us. And if the leaders don't want to sign a deal, we'll make them," said Gil Dickmann, cousin of Carmel Gat, one of the six hostages whose bodies were found in a Gaza tunnel last week. Dickmann took part in a rally at Tel Aviv on Thursday evening, where crowds of demonstrators carried symbolic coffins in a procession, an AFP journalist reported. Key mediator Qatar has said that Israel's approach was "based on an attempt to falsify facts and mislead world public opinion by repeating lies." Such moves "will ultimately lead to the demise of peace efforts," Qatar's foreign ministry warned. The Oct. 7 attack by Hamas resulted in the deaths of 1,205 people, mostly civilians including some hostages killed in captivity, according to official Israeli figures. Of 251 hostages seized by Palestinian militants during the attack, 97 remain in Gaza including 33 the Israeli military says are dead. Scores were released during a one-week truce in November. Israel's retaliatory offensive in Gaza has so far killed at least 40,878 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory. Most of the dead are women and children, according to the UN rights office. Israel kept up its bombardment overnight into Friday, with an AFP correspondent reporting a huge explosion in the east of Gaza City. Six people were killed and others wounded in an Israeli airstrike on a house southeast of the city, Gaza's civil defense agency said Friday. West Bank deadly assault While Israel presses its Gaza offensive, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said the military should use its "full strength" against Palestinian militants in the occupied West Bank. "These terrorist organizations that have various names, whether in Nur al-Shams, Tulkarem, Faraa or Jenin, must be wiped out," he said, referring to cities and refugee camps where an Israeli military operation is underway. The Israeli military said Thursday its aircraft "conducted three targeted strikes on armed terrorists" in the Tubas area, which includes Faraa refugee camp. A strike on a car killed five men aged 21 to 30 and wounded two others, the territory's health ministry. The Palestinian Red Crescent said the Israeli military handed over the dead body of a 17-year-old, after medics were prevented from reaching him when he was wounded. Israel has killed at least 36 Palestinians across the northern West Bank since its assault there started on August 28, according to figures released by the health ministry, including children and militants. One Israeli soldier was killed in Jenin, where the majority of the Palestinian fatalities have been. Polio vaccination drive Israel's bombardment of Gaza has left the territory in ruins, with the destruction of water and sanitation infrastructure blamed for the spread of disease. The humanitarian crisis has led to Gaza's first polio case in 25 years, prompting a massive vaccination effort launched Sunday with localized "humanitarian pauses" in fighting. Nearly 200,000 children in central Gaza have received a first dose, the World Health Organization said, and a second stage got underway Thursday in the south, before medics move north. Louise Wateridge, spokeswoman for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, warned however that the vaccination drive in the south may not reach all children, as some do not reside in the designated zones where Israel has agreed not to strike. The campaign aims to fully vaccinate more than 640,000 children, with second doses due in about four weeks

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JENIN REFUGEE CAMP, West Bank — Israeli forces appeared Friday to have withdrawn from the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, after a more-than weeklong military operation that has left dozens dead and a trail of destruction.   Overnight, Israeli armored personnel carriers were seen leaving the camp from a checkpoint set up on one of the main roads, and an Associated Press reporter inside the camp saw no evidence of any remaining troops inside as dawn broke early Friday morning.   Israel's military had no immediate comment but said it would issue a statement later in the day. It was not clear whether the apparent withdrawal was only a temporary measure to regroup forces.   Hundreds of Israeli troops have been involved for more than a week in what has been their deadliest operation in the occupied West Bank since the Israel-Hamas war began, employing what the United Nations called “lethal war-like tactics.”   Their focus has been the Jenin refugee camp, a stronghold of Palestinian militancy that has grown since the Hamas attack on Israel that started the war in Gaza nearly 11 months ago.  Fighting in Jenin accounts for 21 of 39 Palestinians who local health officials say have been killed during the Israeli push in the West Bank — most of whom, the military says, have been militants.  The fighting has had a devastating effect on Palestinian civilians living in Jenin.   Water and electric services have been cut, families have been confined to their homes and ambulances evacuating the wounded have been slowed on their way to nearby hospitals, as Israeli soldiers search for militants.  In the quiet morning Friday, Jenin residents took advantage of the lull to rummage through the rubble of destroyed buildings and take stock of the damage.   Twisted rebar protruded from the concrete of collapsed buildings, and walls still standing were pockmarked by bullets and shrapnel.   During the operation, Israeli military officials said they were targeting militants in Jenin, Tulkarem and the Al-Faraa refugee camp curb recent attacks against Israeli civilians they say have become more sophisticated and deadly.   It was not immediately clear whether they were also removing troops from the other two camps as well.   The war in Gaza began when Hamas and other militants staged a surprise attack on Israel on Oct. 7, killing around 1,200 people, primarily civilians. Hamas is believed to still be holding more than 100 hostages. Israeli authorities estimate about a third are dead.  Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-controlled Gaza, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants in its count. The ministry reports that more than 94,000 more have been wounded since the start of the war.   Israel has been under increasing pressure from the United States and other allies to reach a cease-fire deal in Gaza, but Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insists on a demand that has emerged as a major sticking point in talks — continued Israeli control of the Philadelphi corridor, a narrow band along Gaza’s border with Egypt where Israel contends Hamas smuggles weapons into Gaza. Egypt and Hamas deny it.  Hamas has accused Israel of dragging out months of negotiations by issuing new demands, including for lasting Israeli control over both Philadelphi corridor and a second corridor running across Gaza.   Hamas has offered to release all hostages in return for an end to the war, the complete withdrawal of Israeli forces and the release of a large number of Palestinian prisoners, including high-profile militants — broadly the terms called for under an outline for a deal put forward by U.S. President Joe Biden in July. 

NAIROBI, Kenya — At least 17 children died after a fire ripped through their primary school dormitory overnight in central Kenya, police said Friday. The blaze in Nyeri county's Hillside Endarasha Academy broke out at around midnight, police said, engulfing rooms where the children were sleeping. The primary school caters to some 800 pupils, aged between roughly 5 and 12. "There are 17 fatalities from this incident and there are also others who were taken to hospital with serious injuries," national police spokesperson Resila Onyango told AFP. "The bodies recovered at the scene were burnt beyond recognition," she said. Police said the average age of the victims was around 9 years old. Several others were injured, Onyango said, 16 of them seriously, and had been rushed to a nearby hospital. "More bodies are likely to be recovered once (the) scene is fully processed," she said. The cause of the fire remains unknown, she said, but an investigation had been launched. President William Ruto expressed his condolences for those killed. "Our thoughts are with the families of the children who have lost their lives in the fire tragedy," he said in a post on X. "This is devastating news." He said he had instructed officials to "thoroughly investigate this horrific incident," and promised that those responsible will be "held to account". The school is located around 170 kilometers north of the capital Nairobi, in Nyeri county. The Kenyan Red Cross said it was on the ground assisting a multi-agency response team. In a post on X, it said it was "providing psychosocial support services to the pupils, teachers and affected families". Deadly blazes There have been numerous school fires in Kenya and across East Africa. In 2016, nine students were killed by a fire at a girls' high school in the Kibera neighborhood of Nairobi. In 2001, 67 pupils were killed by an arson attack on their dormitory at the Kyanguli Mixed Secondary School David Mutiso in Kenya's southern Machakos district. Two pupils were charged with the murder, and the headmaster and deputy of the school were convicted of negligence. In 1994, 40 school children were burned alive and 47 injured in a fire that ravaged the Shauritanga Secondary School for Girls in the northern region of Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

KYIV, Ukraine — Russian attacks on Ukraine overnight caused fires and injured at least five people across the country, local authorities said on Friday. Ukraine's air force said it shot down 27 out of 44 Russia-launched drones with eight more "likely downed by the electronic warfare tools" overnight. Russia also used two missiles in the attack, the air force said in the statement via the Telegram messaging app. The governor of the northeastern region of Kharkiv said a missile attack damaged residential buildings and injured three people in the town of Liubotyn on Friday morning. Dnipropetrovsk regional governor Serhiy Lysak said the air force shot down five drones and one missile over the region. Various overnight attacks in this central region injured two people, damaged over 12 homes and impacted power lines and gas pipelines, he added. Lviv regional authorities said drone debris fell in an industrial zone, setting fire to four trucks. A team of 32 firefighters had put out the fire by the morning and the governor reported no injuries during the attack. Another fire caused by falling debris had been put out in the southern region of Mykolaiv where the air force shot down seven drones, its governor said.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.