Russia says it thwarted a Ukrainian charge to expand its incursion. Kyiv says it won’t occupy land
By: Illia Novikov And Barry Hatton
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia said Tuesday that its forces checked an effort by Ukrainian troops to expand a stunning weeklong incursion into the Kursk region, as a Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman said Kyiv has no intention of occupying Russian territory.
Russian army units, including fresh reserves, aircraft, drone teams and artillery forces, stopped Ukrainian armoured mobile groups from moving deeper into Russia near the Kursk settlements of Obshchy Kolodez, Snagost, Kauchuk and Alexeyevsky, a Russian Defence Ministry statement said.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Heorhii Tykhyi said the cross-border operation was aimed at protecting Ukrainian land from long-range strikes launched from Kursk.
Russian military actions in Ukraine bear “the hallmarks of genocide, inhumane crimes, and Ukraine has every right to wage war in such a way as to paralyze Russia in its aggressive intentions as effectively as possible,” Tusk said.
Kremlin forces intensified their attacks in eastern Ukraine. Ukraine’s General Staff said Tuesday that over the previous 24 hours, Russian troops launched 52 assaults in the area of Pokrovsk, a town in Ukraine’s Donetsk region that is close to the front line. That’s roughly double the number of daily attacks there a week ago.
Tropical Storm Ernesto drenches northeast Caribbean and takes aim at Puerto Rico
By: Dánica Coto
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Tropical Storm Ernesto battered the northeast Caribbean on Tuesday as it took aim at Puerto Rico, where officials shuttered schools, opened shelters and helped move dozens of the U.S. territory’s endangered parrots into hurricane-proof rooms.
Ernesto is expected to become a hurricane early Wednesday, prompting forecasters to issue a hurricane watch for the U.S. and British Virgin Islands as well as the tiny Puerto Rican islands of Vieques and Culebra.
The storm is forecast to move over or near the U.S. Virgin Islands on Tuesday evening and pass just northeast and north of Puerto Rico late Tuesday and early Wednesday.
Heavy rains began pelting Puerto Rico before the storm, and strong winds churned the ocean into a milky turquoise as people rushed to finish securing their homes and businesses.
Ernesto was located about 155 miles (250 kilometres) east-southeast of St. Croix on Tuesday morning. It had maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 kph) and was moving west-northwest at 18 mph (30 kph).
Black bear mauls three-year-old girl in tent at Montana campground
RED LODGE, Mont. (AP) — A black bear mauled and injured a 3-year-old girl in a tent at a private campground in Montana just north of Yellowstone National Park over the weekend, state wildlife officials said.
The girl was attacked at about 10 p.m. Sunday at a campground south of Red Lodge and taken to the hospital in Billings. Fish, Wildlife and Parks didn’t have any information on her condition on Tuesday, game warden Randy Hutzenbiler said.
The campground was evacuated and traps were placed in the area. A bear believed to have been involved was captured and euthanized on Monday afternoon, Hutzenbiler said. The wildlife agency still has traps in the area.
“There were attractants in the area,” Hutzenbiler said, which can include food and unsecured garbage.
The wildlife agency recommends keeping food, garbage and anything with a scent out of tents and stored in bear-resistant containers or vehicles.
Officer faces murder charge in shooting of pregnant Black woman who was accused of shoplifting
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio police officer was indicted Tuesday on murder and other charges in the shooting of Ta’Kiya Young, a 21-year-old pregnant Black mother who was killed after being accused of shoplifting last August.
Young was suspected of stealing bottles of alcohol when Blendon Township police officer Connor Grubb and a fellow officer approached her car. The other officer ordered her out. Instead, she rolled forward toward Grubb, who fired a single bullet through her windshield into her chest. The daughter she was expecting three months later also died.
A Franklin County grand jury indicted Grubb on charges of murder, involuntary manslaughter and felonious assault.
After viewing bodycam footage showing the officer firing the gun, the family called his actions a “gross misuse of power and authority,” especially given that Young had been accused of a relatively minor crime.
A ship in the Red Sea is attacked three times by suspected Yemeni rebels, including with a drone boat
By: Jon Gambrell
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A Liberian-flagged oil tanker in the Red Sea came under attack three times on Tuesday, including in an assault using a bomb-carrying drone boat, likely the latest in a campaign by Yemen’s Houthi rebels over the Israel-Hamas war, officials said.
The attacks come as the rebels’ main sponsor, Iran, weighs possible retaliation against Israel over the assassination of Hamas official Ismail Haniyeh last month in Tehran, Iran’s capital, which has renewed fears of a wider regional war in the Middle East.
Already, the Houthi assaults have disrupted the $1 trillion annual flow of goods through the maritime route crucial to trade among Asia, Europe and the Middle East, while also sparking the most intense combat for the U.S. Navy since World War II.
The Greek-managed Delta Atlantica was first attacked when two explosives detonated near it, according to the Joint Maritime Information Center, a multinational force overseen by the U.S. Navy. A small ship “flashing lights” at the vessel had come close to the loaded tanker bound for Greece during the incident, the centre said.
A small ship later flashed lights at the Delta Atlantica before another explosion near it, the centre said.
The third attack happened hours later on Tuesday, some 180 kilometres (110 miles) northwest of the Houthi-held port city Hodeida, prompting an armed security force aboard the tanker to open fire.
Bangladesh ex-Premier Hasina calls for probe into killings during unrest that led to her ouster
By: Julhas Alam
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina issued a call Tuesday from self-exile in India for an investigation into those responsible for killings of students and others during weeks of violent protests in Bangladesh that prompted her ouster.
Hasina, who stepped down and fled Bangladesh on Aug. 5 after student activists led an uprising against her government, is herself accused of responsibility for much of the deadly violence, along with top officials of her administration.
More than 300 people were killed in unrest that started July with protests against a quota system for government jobs that later morphed into a movement against Hasina’s administration.
Earlier Tuesday, police launched a murder investigation in what was expected to be the first of several cases accusing Hasina and other government officials of responsibility for deaths during the unrest.
Crews battle scattered fires in Athens suburbs, helped by calmer winds and reinforcements
By: Elena Becatoros
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Firefighters in Greece battled scattered fires on Tuesday in hopes of containing the remains of a major wildfire that burned into the northern suburbs of Athens, triggering multiple evacuations and leaving at least one person dead.
With strong winds that had fanned the flames on Sunday and Monday dying down overnight, the fire department said the fire no longer had any active, advancing fronts and firefighters focused on extinguishing hundreds of slow-burning areas. Reinforcements of water-dropping aircraft and firefighters were arriving from abroad after Greece requested assistance from Europe’s joint disaster response mechanism.
Dozens of homes and businesses were reported to have burned, although authorities did not yet have an exact number. Winds strengthened again Tuesday afternoon, but no new major flare-ups were reported.
The European Union’s Copernicus Emergency Management Service, which provides mapping services for natural disasters using satellite images, said that by Monday the blaze had burned 8,500 hectares (21,000 acres, 85 square kilometres).
