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Trump funding freeze halts wildfire prevention work

Trump funding freeze halts wildfire prevention work 150 150 admin

By Nichola Groom

(Reuters) -The Trump administration has halted funding for federal programs to reduce wildfire risk in western U.S. states and has frozen hiring of seasonal firefighters as part of broad cuts to government spending, according to organizations impacted by the moves.

The reduction in resources for wildfire prevention comes a month after devastating blazes in Los Angeles that are expected to be the costliest in U.S. history, with some expecting losses as high as $35 billion.

The Oregon-based non-profit Lomakatsi Restoration Project said its contracts with the federal agencies, including the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to reduce hazardous fuels in Oregon, California and Idaho, have been frozen.

“The funding freeze has impacted more than 30 separate grants and agreements that Lomakatsi has with federal agencies, including pending awards as well as active agreements that are already putting work on the ground,” Executive Director Marko Bey said in a letter to U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat.

In an interview, Bey said his organization was forced to lay off 15 people and issue stop work orders on many active projects, impacting other jobs in the region. About 65% of the organization’s budget comes from funding allocated under the Inflation Reduction Act, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act – laws enacted under former U.S. President Joe Biden.

“It doesn’t matter what your political perspective is, we all agree we have to reduce fire hazards,” Bey said. “But right now, with the funding freeze, we can’t operate programs because of the uncertainty of when we are going to get paid.”

The American Loggers Council, a logging industry group, said the funding freeze has also stopped work under the $20 million Hazardous Fuels Transportation Assistance program, which pays for removing dead wood from forests.

“In a period that has so recently demonstrated the catastrophic impacts of wildfires it is all the more evident that hazardous fuels landscape treatment and forest management is urgently needed,” Scott Dane, executive director of the American Loggers Council, said in a letter.

He called on the administration to exempt forest management programs from the broad suspension in federal funding.

A spokesperson for the Agriculture department, which oversees the Forest Service, said all programs and personnel were under review.

“The Department of Agriculture will be happy to provide a response to interested parties once Secretary Brooke Rollins has the opportunity to analyze these reviews,” the spokesperson said.

The agency also said it was working with the U.S. Office of Personnel Management on its wildland firefighting positions, which it said are public safety jobs.

A spokesperson for the Interior Department, the parent agency of the BLM and National Parks Service, said it was reviewing funding decisions.

“The Department of the Interior continues to review funding decisions to be consistent with the president’s executive orders,” the spokesperson said. “The Department’s ongoing review of funding complies with all applicable laws, rules, regulations and orders.”

Senate Democrats have called on the administration to unlock fire mitigation funding, and separately have asked Interior and the U.S. Department of Agriculture leadership to exempt seasonal firefighters from a broad federal hiring freeze.

U.S. agencies hire about 15,000 seasonal firefighters each year, according to the office of Senator Alex Padilla, a California Democrat.

Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, an advocacy group for federal firefighters, said its members have been unable to hire the hundreds of firefighters that are typically brought on this time of year to gear up for the summer fire season.

“The agencies already have had a recruitment and retention problem,” Riva Duncan, vice president of the Grassroots Wildland Firefighters, said in an interview. “This just exacerbates that problem.”

Dry conditions and a buildup of fuel on lands throughout the West have prompted more frequent and intense fires in recent years.

U.S. President Donald Trump repeatedly has blamed poor forest management for catastrophic wildfires, including during a recent visit to the burn area in Los Angeles.

(Reporting by Nichola Groom; editing by Diane Craft and Chris Reese)

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Russian forces take control of two settlements in eastern Ukraine, TASS says

Russian forces take control of two settlements in eastern Ukraine, TASS says 150 150 admin

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russian forces have taken control of two frontline settlements in eastern Donetsk region, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Friday.

A ministry report said Russian forces had captured the village of Zelene Pole located between Pokrovsk, the focal point of Russian attacks in the region, and Velyuka Novosilka, a settlement that Russia’s military said it captured late last month.

Also captured, according to the Russian report, was the village of Dachne, west of the town of Kurakhove, which Russia’s military said it also captured last month. The town had been subjected to weeks of heavy fighting.

The General Staff of Ukraine’s military, in a late evening report, said both villages were among 11 settlements that had come under Russian attack in the Pokrovsk sector. But it made no mention of them coming under Russian control.

Reuters could not independently confirm battlefield reports from either side.

Ukraine’s DeepState military blog, which tracks frontline positions based on open source reports, said this week that Russian forces had made advances near Zelene Pole and Dachne.

Russian forces failed in their initial bid to advance on Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, after the February 2022 invasion and have since concentrated on capturing Donbas, made up of the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk.

They have been making steady progress across Donetsk region for months, capturing a long string of villages.

But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Thursday praised the “good success” of a regiment based near Pokrovsk, without identifying where the operation had taken place.

At least one foreign blogger has noted Ukrainian counterattacks in the area.

(Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Gleb Stolyarov; Editing by Andrew Osborn, Ron Popeski and Leslie Adler)

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Trump backs ‘hard stance’ on Gaza, says he does not know what Israel will do

Trump backs ‘hard stance’ on Gaza, says he does not know what Israel will do 150 150 admin

By Trevor Hunnicutt and Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump on Friday advocated taking a “hard stance” on Gaza, the Palestinian enclave for which he has proposed a U.S. takeover and where a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian Hamas militants is in place.

Trump had said this week that Hamas should release all Israeli hostages in Gaza by Saturday midday or “let hell break out.”

“I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow (Saturday) at 12’o clock. If it was up to me, I would take a very hard stance but I can’t tell you what Israel is going to do,” Trump told reporters on Friday.

A ceasefire went into effect just before Trump returned to the presidency on January 20.

Some Israeli hostages have been released by Hamas and Palestinian prisoners have been released by Israel since then.

The U.N. human rights office has described images of both emaciated Israeli hostages and Palestinian detainees released as distressing, saying they reflected the dire conditions in which they were held.

Trump on Friday reiterated his concerns about the appearances of released Israeli hostages without commenting on the state of the Palestinians.

U.S. ally Israel’s military assault on Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians since October 2023, according to the Gaza health ministry, and led to accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies. The assault internally displaced nearly Gaza’s entire population and caused a hunger crisis.

The latest bloodshed in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict was triggered on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking some 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.

Trump has faced international condemnation for his proposal to take over Gaza and permanently displace Palestinians there. Rights experts and the United Nations have called it a proposal for ethnic cleansing.

(Reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt and Kanishka Singh; Editing by Will Dunham)

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Trump team makes confused start to Ukraine diplomacy

Trump team makes confused start to Ukraine diplomacy 150 150 admin

By Simon Lewis and Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – This was a disorienting week for those anxious over how the new Trump administration will fulfill Donald Trump’s vow to end the Ukraine war.

As the U.S. president took his first steps toward diplomacy over the nearly three-year conflict, comments from his top officials left many unsure what he has planned for the biggest security crisis to face Europe in decades.

Trump spoke to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy by phone on Wednesday and tasked officials with kickstarting negotiations, adding that a summit with Putin in Saudi Arabia was likely.

The calls blindsided European allies already wondering what to make of comments from Trump’s defense secretary, Pete Hegseth.

Hegseth told NATO allies earlier on Wednesday that it was unrealistic for Ukraine to join the alliance as part of a negotiated settlement with Russia, that Kyiv’s hopes of restoring its 2014 borders were an “illusionary goal,” and that the United States would not send troops as part of a security force in Ukraine.

He appeared to backtrack on his own remarks the next day, telling a press conference that “everything is on the table” for Ukraine war negotiations.

On Friday, Vice President JD Vance sowed more confusion, suggesting in a Wall Street Journal interview that the U.S. would reserve options for pressuring Moscow, including sending U.S. troops to Ukraine, which would be a major shift from former President Joe Biden’s policy of keeping American forces off the battlefield there.

Vance later said on X the Journal had twisted his words, saying “American troops should never be put into harm’s way where it doesn’t advance American interests and security.”

Ambassador Daniel Fried, a retired U.S. diplomat now with the Atlantic Council think tank, said the administration’s messaging had been contradictory but that officials had left themselves room to negotiate an acceptable outcome with Russia.

“They’re all over the map, they have trouble getting a disciplined line, but they haven’t ruled anything out. They’ve covered the position in a cloud of ambiguity and uncertainty,” he said.

CONCESSIONS TO PUTIN?

The administration’s comments left the impression among some European allies that the Trump administration was making concessions to Putin before any negotiations had taken place.

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius on Friday called the administration’s approach “clumsy” and “a mistake.”

Putin had “not budged an inch” on his negotiating position so it was not in the West’s interests to do so, he said at the Munich Security Conference, where defense officials and diplomats gathered this week.

“It would have been much better to talk about possible NATO membership and territorial changes at the negotiating table,” Pistorius said.

Republican U.S. Senator Roger Wicker, who chairs the Senate’s Armed Services Committee, slammed what he called a “rookie mistake” by Hegseth to apparently cede Ukraine’s border before negotiations have begun, adding he was “puzzled” and “disturbed” by Hegseth’s comments.

“Everybody knows … and people in the administration know you don’t say before your first meeting what you will agree to and what you won’t agree to,” Wicker told Politico on Friday.

There were also questions over who would carry out Trump’s Ukraine policy. He named in a social media post negotiators including Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, who flew to Russia on Tuesday to conduct a prisoner swap, but leaving out Ukraine envoy Keith Kellogg.

The White House later clarified that Kellogg was still involved in Ukraine policy.

Fried said that despite the confused messaging, Trump’s priorities on Ukraine were coming into view and could lead to a “good outcome” for Ukraine. Those priorities appeared to be securing a ceasefire quickly, that Ukraine must have security guarantees and that European rather than U.S. troops would be on the ground to secure the peace, Fried said.

“A good outcome means the war stops, 80% of Ukraine is free, and there are security guarantees for Ukraine sufficient that Russia won’t start the war again. That is a strategic victory for Ukraine,” Fried said.

(Reporting by Simon Lewis and Steve Holland; additional reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Don Durfee and Rosalba O’Brien)

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Ukraine has low chance of survival without US backing, Zelenskiy says on NBC

Ukraine has low chance of survival without US backing, Zelenskiy says on NBC 150 150 admin

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Ukraine has a low chance of surviving Russia’s assault without U.S. support, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press with Kristen Welker” program.

“Probably it will be very, very, very difficult. And of course, in all the difficult situations, you have a chance. But we will have low chance — low chance to survive without support of the United States,” Zelenskiy said in the interview. An excerpt from the program was released on Friday and the full show will be broadcast on Sunday.

His comments come after phone calls held earlier in the week by U.S. President Donald Trump with Zelenskiy and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington)

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Trump keeps tariffs drumbeat going, with autos targeted next

Trump keeps tariffs drumbeat going, with autos targeted next 150 150 admin

By Dan Burns

NEW YORK (Reuters) – President Donald Trump on Friday kept alive his drumbeat of tariff threats, saying levies on automobiles would be coming as soon as April 2, the day after members of his cabinet are due to deliver reports to him outlining options for a range of import duties as he seeks to reshape global trade.

“Maybe around April 2,” Trump said in response to a question about when auto tariffs might be coming, during an executive-order signing session in the Oval Office. “I would have done them on April 1… But we’re going to do it on April 2.”

It was the latest in a litany of trade actions Trump has unveiled since taking office for the second time on January 20.

Since his inauguration, he has imposed a 10% tariff on all imports from China, on top of existing levies; announced and then delayed for a month 25% tariffs on goods from Mexico and non-energy imports from Canada; set a March 12 start date for 25% tariffs on all imported steel and aluminum; and on Thursday directed his economics team to devise plans for reciprocal tariffs on every country that taxes U.S. imports.

It has been a blur of orders that Trump has asserted will level the playing field for American goods abroad and reinvigorate a long-declining U.S. manufacturing base but which have also sown confusion among businesses, irked long-standing U.S. allies and stoked worries among consumers and economists about a renewed upswing in inflation.

Trump offered no other details for his auto tariff intentions before heading to his Florida estate for the weekend. But what he views as unfair treatment of U.S. automotive exports in foreign markets has long been a sore spot for him. The European Union, for instance, collects a 10% tariff on vehicle imports, four times the U.S. passenger car tariff rate of 2.5%. The U.S., though, collects a 25% tariff on highly profitable imported pickup trucks.

“We applaud President Trump’s idea to look at all vehicle imports to the U.S., an important step forward,” Ford Motor Co Chief Executive Jim Farley said on X after Trump’s remarks. “Comprehensive trade policies are imperative to achieving the president’s vision to strengthen the U.S. auto industry.”

Earlier in the week Farley said Trump’s proposed and implemented tariffs have added “a lot of cost and a lot of chaos.”

According to auto data collector Ward’s Intelligence, close to a quarter of new vehicles sold in the U.S. last year were classified as imported, which in their data excludes vehicles built in the U.S., Canada or Mexico. The trade pact for the North American trading partners that Trump revamped in his first term, the US-Canada-Mexico Agreement, or USMCA, lays out extensive rules of origin for the parts included in vehicles built in the three countries. All vehicles determined to have at least 75% of their parts originating from the three countries are not subject to tariffs.

USMCA is up for a scheduled review in 2026, and a number of analysts view Trump’s comments on tariffs on autos and Canadian and Mexican goods as an opening bid to renegotiate a pact he described as the “greatest” trade deal ever.

“We have not seen any details at this time. Ford, GM and Stellantis continue to believe that vehicles and auto parts that meet the USMCA requirements should not be subject to additional tariffs,” said Matt Blunt, president of the American Automotive Policy Council, which represents the interests of Ford, General Motors and Stellantis.

Trump’s directive on Thursday required his top economic advisers to draw up plans to impose like-for-like tariffs on goods from any country that collects an import tax on U.S. goods. His nominee to run the Commerce Department, Howard Lutnick, said he expected those reviews to be completed and submitted to Trump by April 1.

(Reporting by Dan Burns; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Rosalba O’Brien)

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Thai police to return 10 Chinese suspects linked to actor’s abduction

Thai police to return 10 Chinese suspects linked to actor’s abduction 150 150 admin

BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thai authorities will send 10 Chinese nationals who were involved in the abduction of actor Wang Xing back to China, police said on Friday, amid a mounting crackdown on scam centres that was triggered by the actor’s kidnapping. 

Wang Xing went missing in January after he was lured to Thailand by the promise of a lucrative acting job. Thai police later found him in Myanmar and he has since returned home.

His disappearance drew national interest in China after his girlfriend began a social media campaign about his plight and renewed an international effort to crack down on these illegal operations, which have been in place for years. 

Hundreds of thousands of people have been lured and abducted by criminal gangs and forced to work in illegal online operations that have defrauded billions annually across Southeast Asia, according to the the United Nations.

The 10 Chinese suspects were part of a group operating in Myanmar’s Myawaddy town and defrauded Chinese people, Police General Thatchai Pitaneelaboot, a Royal Thai Police inspector-general said. 

They were travelling to Cambodia through Thailand, where they were arrested and will be sent to China for legal action, Thai police said in a statement.

China has given Thailand the name of 3,700 individuals who are believed to be criminals running fraud centres in Myanmar, Thatchai said.  

Earlier this week, Thailand received over 200 call centre victims from Myanmar. 

A spokesman for the Karen National Army (KNA), a Myanmar rebel group that controls territory around Myawaddy, told Reuters it plans to send back thousands more. 

“We are cracking down on the situation, but it takes time. We are trying to send the people back as quick as possible,” Major Naing Maung Zaw said.

Thailand earlier this month cut electricity, fuel and internet supply to parts of Myanmar where the illegal compounds operate, reflecting growing unease in Bangkok over the impact of scam centres on the vital tourism sector.

(Reporting by Panarat Thepgumpanat, and Chayut Setboonsarng; Additional reporting by Shoon Naing; Editing by William Maclean)

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Trump’s apparent concessions on Ukraine NATO ties, territory ‘a mistake’, German defence minister says

Trump’s apparent concessions on Ukraine NATO ties, territory ‘a mistake’, German defence minister says 150 150 admin

BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s defence minister said it was a mistake for U.S. President Donald Trump to take the bargaining chips of Ukrainian NATO membership and territorial concessions off the table ahead of possible talks to end Russia’s war with Ukraine.

Speaking on his arrival at the Munich Security Conference on Friday, Boris Pistorius said that Russian President Vladimir Putin had “not budged an inch” on his negotiating position so it was not in the other side’s interests to do so.

“I think that was clumsy. I think that was a mistake,” he said of the position of Trump and his defense secretary. “It would have been much better to talk about possible NATO membership and territorial changes at the negotiating table.”

If European countries were to be involved in upholding any kind of Ukraine-Russia peace deal, they will have to be involved in negotiating it, Pistorius said, speaking two days after Trump had a call on Ukraine with Putin without notifying Washington’s NATO allies or Ukraine in advance.

He also said that for the coming years, Europe would not be in a position to guarantee a peace accord on its own without U.S. support.

For that reason, he said, it was essential to reform both the European Union’s Maastricht debt criteria and Germany’s own debt brake to make it easier for European NATO members to spend more on defence, as the Trump administration is demanding.

“Nobody can believe any longer than 2% is enough,” he said, referring to NATO’s target of 2% of GDP on military spending for its members. Trump has called on European allies to crank up defence spending to up to 5% of GDP.

It was reasonable, Pistorius said, for the U.S. to want to reorient its security focus towards the Indo-Pacific region and spend less on Europe’s defence, but for this, there had to be a roadmap for a gradual transition. On this, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had agreed with him, Pistorius said.

In his overseas debut after taking charge of the Pentagon on Jan. 24, Hegseth raised an uproar in Europe in announcing on Wednesday that a return to Ukraine’s borders of 2014, when Russia seized and annexed Crimea, was unrealistic and that Washington does not see NATO membership for Kyiv as part of a solution to the war triggered by Russia’s 2022 invasion.

Hegseth’s critics say the remarks amounted to the U.S. ceding leverage in negotiations with Russia before they even started, in what they described as a major victory for Putin, whose force now control 20% of Ukraine.

On Thursday, Hegseth appeared to backtrack on his own remarks, telling a press conference that “everything is on the table” for Ukraine war negotiations and that it was up to Trump to decide what concessions will be made.

Also on Thursday, a senior U.S. foreign policy official said the United States had not ruled out potential NATO membership for Ukraine or a negotiated return to pre-2014 borders, contradicting the earlier comments.

(Reporting by Thomas Escritt; editing by Thomas Seythal and Mark Heinrich)

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Australian and Philippine police help would-be victims avoid online love scams on Valentine’s Day

Australian and Philippine police help would-be victims avoid online love scams on Valentine’s Day 150 150 admin

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Australian and Philippine authorities took steps on Valentine’s Day to help would-be victims avoid hurting their “hearts and bank accounts” in online love scams.

The Australian Federal Police, with the help of Filipino authorities, on Friday publicized online dialogues used by an online love scam syndicate, which had been dismantled in the Philippines, to help foster vigilance.

“The Australian Federal Police is flipping the script on romance scammers this Valentine’s Day by revealing real-life dialogue used to target the bank accounts — and hearts — of thousands of potential victims online,” a joint statement by the Australian police, the Philippine Anti-Organized Crime Commission and other law enforcement agencies said.

Philippine authorities raided the syndicate’s hideout near Manila in October, arrested more than 250 mostly Chinese suspected members and seized computers and other gadgets used in the online fraud.

After an investigation, Australian and Philippine police found the syndicate had attempted to victimize about 5,000 people in Australia alone. They were trying to check if those Australians have already been defrauded, Australian Federal Police officer Kathleen Oehlers said in a news conference in Manila with Philippine anti-crime officials.

About $15 million have been lost to such online love scams from victims in Australia last year alone, according to Oehlers.

Under the scheme, the suspects would hunt for potential victims, mostly fully employed males, in online dating apps and then use romantic dialogues to develop a whirlwind romance online. A victim would later be encouraged by a scammer under cover of a fake picture and identity to invest in cryptocurrency, initially with relatively small amounts, before shifting the funds to the syndicate’s account, Oehlers said.

Philippine Undersecretary Gilbert Cruz, who heads the Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission, said that aside from publicizing the dialogues used by the syndicate to lure and defraud victims, the Australian police also provided crucial tips online. They included being wary of red flags like “overly affectionate behavior,” he said.

Philippine authorities would take similar steps to foster vigilance, Cruz said.

“The scammer would portray a kind-hearted Filipino woman living in Australia or a local female resident in the Philippines, heartbroken by an ex-fiance who wanted my money, not my love,’” the statement said.

“I’m sorry if our first day of chat is very emotional. By the way, how’s your business?” according to one of the scripts used by the syndicate to shift the topic to cryptocurrency investment.

Last year, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. ordered the closure of the mostly Chinese-run online gaming operations up to the end of 2024, accusing them of venturing into crimes, including financial scams, human trafficking, torture, kidnappings and murder.

The Chinese-run online gambling outfits were estimated to number more than 400 across the Philippines and employ hundreds of thousands of Chinese and Southeast Asian nationals.

The ban forced many remaining syndicates to break into smaller outfits in the Philippines and diversify their operations into an array of online love, cryptocurrency and investment scams, the Philippine anti-organized crime commission said.

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Middle East latest: 3 Israeli men named as latest to be freed in hostage release

Middle East latest: 3 Israeli men named as latest to be freed in hostage release 150 150 admin

The families of Israeli hostages still held by the Hamas militant group have released the names of three hostages expected to be freed on Saturday.

The Hostages Families Forum said Friday in a statement that it welcomed the “joyous news” that Iair Horn, 46, Sagui Dekel Chen, 36, and Sasha Troufanov, 29, are set to be freed after 498 days in Hamas captivity.

All three men were taken from the same hard-hit kibbutz on Oct. 7, 2023.

The news came after Hamas said Thursday it would release the next three Israeli hostages as planned this weekend in exchange for Palestinian prisoners, raising the prospect of resolving a major dispute over the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.

Israel, with the support of U.S. President Donald Trump, has said it will resume fighting if the hostages are not freed, but did not immediately comment on the statement by Hamas.

Hamas had said it was going to delay the hostage release because Israel wasn’t keeping up its side of the ceasefire agreement. Hamas said Israel wasn’t allowing enough shelters, medical supplies, fuel and heavy equipment for clearing rubble into Gaza, among other alleged violations of the truce.

The sides have carried out five swaps since the ceasefire began on Jan. 19, freeing 21 hostages and over 730 Palestinian prisoners so far during the first phase of the truce. The war could resume if no agreement is reached on the more complicated second phase, which calls for the return of all remaining hostages captured in Hamas’ attack on Oct. 7, 2023, and an indefinite extension of the truce.

Here’s the latest:

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JERUSALEM — The three men set to be freed by Hamas on Saturday in the sixth wave of hostage releases under the Israel-Hamas ceasefire are all Israeli civilians with dual nationalities.

All were from the same communal farm, Kibbutz Nir Oz, where some 80 of roughly 400 residents were taken hostage in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack.

The men are Israeli-Argentinian Iair Horn, 46, Israel-Russian Alexander (Sasha) Troufanov, 29, and Israeli-American Sagui Dekel Chen, 36.

Horn is an Israel-Argentinian who was kidnapped along with his brother, Eitan Horn, who was staying with him at the time. Eitan Horn remains in Hamas captivity.

Chen was outside working on a bus renovation when militants stormed the kibbutz. His wife, Avital, hid in the safe room with their two daughters. Avital was seven months pregnant and gave birth to a third daughter, Shachar Mazal, in December, while Dekel Chen was in captivity.

Israeli-Russian Sasha Trufanov was taken hostage along with three members of his family: grandmother Irena Tati, mother Yelena (Lena) and his girlfriend Sapir Cohen. Sasha’s father Vitaly Trufanov was killed on October 7, 2023. The rest of his family was released in a brief ceasefire period November 2023.

Hamas released the names in a statement earlier Friday. Saturday’s release will be the sixth since the Israel-Hamas ceasefire took effect.

ANKARA, Turkey – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan continued his strong criticism of U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposal to relocate Palestinians from Gaza, arguing that the U.S. president was making a mistake by trusting Israeli “lies” and disregarding the “history and values” of the region.

Speaking to a group of journalists on his return from a trip to three Asian nations, Erdogan urged Trump to fulfil his promises to promote peace rather than conflict.

“Believing what (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu — whose legal process is still ongoing in his country — says will do nothing but shed blood in the region,” Erdogan said, according to a transcript of comments that were made available to The Associated Press on Friday. “This will not bring the longed-for peace, on the contrary, it will deepen conflicts and increase blood and tears.”

Erdogan, a vocal advocate of Palestinian rights, also appeared to suggest that the U.S. president should refrain from taking decisions regarding the region without consultations.

“There is no room for a ‘it’s done whether you like it or not’ approach in this region,” Erdogan said. “The expulsion of the Palestinian people from Gaza is unacceptable.”

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