World

Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe was on Wednesday given the additional responsibility of running the finance ministry as the island nation grapples with its worst-ever economic crisis.

The South Asian island nation has suffered months of dire shortages and anti-government protests, with importers unable to finance vital food, fuel and medicines.

Wickremesinghe, 73, was sworn in as finance minister after two weeks of wrangling among coalition partners for the crucial position ahead of bailout talks with the International Monetary Fund.

His appointment was delayed by a dispute between Wickremesinghe and the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) party of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa over who would take the post.

“The president’s party had wanted the finance portfolio, but the PM insisted he wanted it if he is to lead the country out of the economic chaos,” a top politician involved in the negotiations told AFP, on condition of anonymity.

Wickremesinghe is expected to soon unveil a revised budget promising relief for poorer Sri Lankans suffering through record inflation and spiralling food prices. 

Staff-level talks with the IMF concluded on Tuesday, but it is expected to take six more months for the Washington-based lender to agree on a bailout package, central bank officials said.

Sri Lanka has already defaulted on its $51 billion foreign debt and appointed international consultants on Tuesday to help restructure its international sovereign bonds and other bilateral loans.

The government has effectively ended subsidies on fuel by raising prices to a record high on Tuesday, and Wickremesinghe’s administration is expected to hike electricity and water tariffs to raise much-needed revenue. 

Petrol and diesel both remain in short supply and motorists are forced to queue, sometimes for days, to fill up.

-Fresh loan-

The government this week announced it was seeking a fresh $500 million loan from India to purchase fuel, in addition to two credit lines worth $700 million already provided by New Delhi.

The census office reported Monday that the country’s overall inflation last month was a staggering 33.8 percent year on year, with food inflation at an even higher 45.1 percent.

Sri Lanka’s foreign reserves shrank dramatically from 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic hit tourism and remittances from Sri Lankans abroad.

The pandemic compounded liquidity problems triggered by huge tax cuts introduced in 2019 soon after President Rajapaksa took office.

Protesters have demanded the president quit over government mismanagement of the crisis. 

His elder brother, Mahinda Rajapaksa stepped down as prime minister two weeks ago, clearing the way for Wickremesinghe’s appointment.

A teenage gunman killed at least 19 young children and two teachers at an elementary school in Texas on Tuesday, prompting a furious President Joe Biden to denounce the US gun lobby and vow to end the nation’s cycle of mass shootings.

The attack in Uvalde — a small community about an hour from the Mexican border — was the deadliest US school shooting in years, and the latest in a spree of bloody gun violence across America.

“It’s time to turn this pain into action for every parent, for every citizen of this country,” Biden said, his voice heavy with emotion.

“It’s time for those who obstruct or delay or block common sense gun laws — we need to let you know that we will not forget,” he said.

“As a nation, we have to ask when in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby? When in God’s name will we do what we all know in our gut needs to be done?”

Texas Governor Greg Abbott, addressing an earlier news conference, named the suspect as Salvador Ramos, an 18-year-old local resident and a US citizen.

“He shot and killed, horrifically and incomprehensibly,” Abbott said.

Texas Department of Public Safety officials told CNN the gunman is believed to have shot his grandmother before heading to Robb Elementary School around noon where he abandoned his vehicle and entered with a handgun and a rifle, wearing body armor.

– More than dozen children wounded –

The gunman was killed by responding officers, the officials said, adding later two teachers also died in the attack.

“Right now there’s 19 children that were killed by this evil gunman, as well as two teachers from this school,” DPS spokesman Lieutenant Chris Olivarez told NBC News.

More than a dozen children were also wounded in the attack at the school, which teaches more than 500, mostly Hispanic and economically disadvantaged students.

Uvalde Memorial Hospital said on Facebook it had received 13 children while University Health hospital in San Antonio said on Twitter it had received a 66-year-old woman and a 10-year-old girl, both in critical condition, and two other girls aged nine and 10.

At least one Border Patrol agent responding to the incident was wounded in an exchange of gunfire with the shooter, Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Marsha Espinosa tweeted.

Footage showed small groups of children weaving through parked cars and yellow buses, some holding hands as they fled under police escort from the school, which teaches students aged around seven to 10 years old.

It was the deadliest such incident since the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut, in which 20 children and six staff were killed.

The White House ordered flags to be flown at half-mast in mourning for the victims — whose deaths sent a wave of shock through a country still scarred by the horror of Sandy Hook.

– ‘Happens nowhere else’ –

Ted Cruz, a pro-gun rights Republican senator from Texas, tweeted that he and his wife were “lifting up in prayer the children and families in the horrific shooting in Uvalde.”

But Senator Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, where the Sandy Hook shooting took place, made an impassioned appeal for concrete action to prevent further violence.

“This isn’t inevitable, these kids weren’t unlucky. This only happens in this country and nowhere else. Nowhere else do little kids go to school thinking that they might be shot that day,” Murphy said on the Senate floor in Washington.

“I’m here on this floor to beg, to literally get down on my hands and knees and beg my colleagues: Find a path forward here. Work with us to find a way to pass laws that make this less likely.”

The deadly assault in Texas follows a series of mass shootings in the United States this month.

On May 14, an 18-year-old man shot 10 people dead at a Buffalo, New York grocery store.

Wearing heavy body armor and wielding an AR-15 rifle, the self-declared white supremacist livestreamed his attack, having reportedly targeted the store because of the large surrounding African American population.

The following day, a man blocked the door of a church in Laguna Woods, California and opened fire on its Taiwanese-American congregation, killing one person and wounding five.

Despite recurring mass-casualty shootings, multiple initiatives to reform gun regulations have failed in the US Congress, leaving states and local councils to strengthen — or weaken — their own restrictions.

The National Rifle Association has been instrumental in fighting against stricter US gun laws. Abbott and Cruz are listed as speakers at a forum that is being held by the powerful lobby in Houston, Texas later this week.

The United States suffered 19,350 firearm homicides in 2020, up nearly 35 percent compared to 2019, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in its latest data.

North Korea fired a volley of missiles early Wednesday including a suspected intercontinental ballistic missile, just hours after US President Joe Biden left Asia after a trip overshadowed by Pyongyang’s sabre-rattling.

Three missiles — including one suspected ICBM — were fired from the Sunan area in Pyongyang, Seoul said, where an airfield has become a key site used in multiple recent weapons tests by the nuclear-armed regime.

The launch, one of nearly 20 weapons tests by Pyongyang so far this year, prompted joint US-South Korea live fire missile drills in response, as both sides slammed what they called continued “provocations” by the nuclear-armed state.

The tests are “an illegal act in direct violation of UN Security Council resolutions,” Seoul’s government said after a National Security Council meeting chaired by new President Yoon Suk-yeol. 

The United States condemned the “destabilizing” launches, and called for Pyongyang to “engage in sustained and substantive dialogue,” a state department spokesman said.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement that it had “detected at around 0600 (2100 GMT), 0637 and 0642 the firings of ballistic missiles launched from Sunan area towards the East Sea”, it said, referring to the Sea of Japan.

“The first ballistic missile (suspected ICBM) had a range of around 360 kilometres (225 miles) and an altitude of around 540km,” Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.

The second ballistic missile “disappeared at an altitude of 20km” and the third — a suspected short range ballistic missile — travelled around 760km at an altitude of around 60km.

– Response to Biden –

The Wednesday launches are the latest in a blitz of sanctions-busting weapons tests by Pyongyang this year, including test-firing intercontinental ballistic missiles at full range for the first time since 2017.

The latest apparent test come just days after Biden left South Korea Sunday after a trip overshadowed by US and South Korean officials warning that Kim could carry out a nuclear test while Biden was in the region.

The tests were “clearly timed for President Biden’s return after his visit to South Korea and Japan,” Park Won-gon, a professor at Ewha University said, adding that Biden hadn’t even touched down in the US.

During Biden’s visit, South Korea and the US announced they would look at ramping up joint military exercises, which had been scaled back for Covid and during a bout of failed diplomacy with the North.

They also discussed deploying more US tactical assets to the peninsula — all which would likely enrage Pyongyang, which views the drills as rehearsals for invasion.

“North Korea’s objections against these announcements was expressed through the missile launches,” Park said.

On his last day in Seoul, Biden told reporters he had a only a short message for Kim: “Hello. Period.” 

But he added that the United States was “prepared for anything North Korea does”.

– Covid and missiles –

“Pyongyang appears to have launched different types of missiles, probably in the process of improving related military capabilities,” said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul. 

“But this also looks like a statement that the Kim regime has many different ways of striking an adversary.”

Kim has recently doubled down on his programme of military modernisation.

Despite struggling with a recent Covid-19 outbreak, new satellite imagery has indicated the North has resumed construction at a long-dormant nuclear reactor.

Earlier this month, North Korea confirmed its first ever Omicron cases in Pyongyang, and the virus has since torn through its unvaccinated population of 25 million.

More than three million people have been sick with “fever” North Korean state media said Wednesday, with 68 deaths since the outbreak began in late April.

North Korea has continued to conduct missile tests since it declared a national emergency over the Covid outbreak, although state media has not reported on the launches, as it usually does.

“It shows Pyongyang’s intent to achieve two objectives simultaneously: overcoming the outbreak and enhancing its nuclear arsenal,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies. 

“Kim seems to be saying that the North is in charge of the security issues that are affecting the Korean peninsula, not Washington,” he added. 

Seoul’s Foreign Minister Park Jin and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke on the phone after the Wednesday launches, the Foreign Ministry said. 

The pair said it was “deeply deplorable” that North Korea “is using its main financial resources for nuclear and missile developments rather than quarantine and improvement of people’s livelihood” in the outbreak.

All roads leading into Pakistan’s capital Islamabad were blocked on Wednesday ahead of a major protest planned by ousted prime minister Imran Khan and his supporters. 

Since being removed from power through a no-confidence vote last month, Khan has heaped pressure on the country’s fragile new coalition government by staging mass rallies across the country.

The international cricket star-turned-politician plans on Wednesday to lead tens of thousands of people from his power base in the northwestern city of Peshawar to the capital demanding fresh elections — in a centre-piece showdown with his rivals.  

The coalition government headed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has pledged to stop Khan’s supporters from pouring into the city, calling the rally an attempt to “divide the nation and promote chaos”. 

“Nobody should be allowed to besiege the capital and dictate his terms,” interior minister Rana Sanaullah said on Tuesday.

Entry and exit points on key highways that lead to the capital were blocked by police around the nearest main cities of Peshawar, Lahore, and Multan. 

Islamabad police on Wednesday published a traffic plan showing a complete blockade of the city and a heavy security presence. 

On Tuesday, Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) accused police of arresting and detaining hundreds of its supporters in overnight raids. 

Police sources in Lahore who asked not to be named told AFP more than 200 supporters were detained on public order offences. 

The government and police have said that protestors had been planning to join the march with weapons.

One police officer was shot dead during the raids, Punjab Chief Minister Hamza Shahbaz Sharif said.

But a defiant Khan told reporters in Peshawar he would lead the largest march in Pakistan’s history. 

“I don’t consider it politics but jihad,” Khan said, referring to a term used by Muslims to describe a struggle.

In 2018, Khan was voted in by an electorate weary of the dynastic politics of the country’s two major parties.

The popular former sports star — who enjoyed the backing of the country’s powerful military — had promised to sweep away decades of entrenched corruption and cronyism but is believed to have fallen out with Pakistan’s generals.

He was brought down in part by his failure to rectify the country’s dire economic situation, including its crippling debt, shrinking foreign currency reserves and soaring inflation.

Republican voters delivered a stark repudiation Tuesday of Donald Trump’s “Big Lie” that the 2020 US election was stolen, backing Georgia Governor Brian Kemp for re-election by a huge margin over a candidate recruited by the former president.

Trump had banked much of his own political capital hand-picking David Perdue to oust Kemp in the nominating contest to compete for the governor’s mansion in November’s midterm elections.

Perdue made Trump’s bogus claims about 2020 a centerpiece of his campaign, in a direct appeal to his endorser’s supporters who continue wrongly to question the validity of the outcome.

But the former senator was forced to concede, in an embarrassing blow for Trump, as the early count showed him trailing by almost 50 points less than 90 minutes after polls closed.

“Four years of the Kemp administration will mean that you keep all of your hard-earned money,” Kemp said in his victory address.

“Your communities will be safe. Your kids will be in school without fear of partisan agendas in the classroom. Parents will have a voice and we’ll keep working to bring good paying jobs to every corner of our state.”

Kemp, frequently the target of Trump’s wrath for refusing to help overturn the election, was always expected to win, but the margin of defeat represents a stinging rebuke of Trump from a state he lost by the narrowest of margins in 2020.

Five states were holding nominating contests for congressional elections that will decide which party controls the US Senate and House of Representatives for the remainder of President Joe Biden’s first term.

But all eyes are on Georgia, where wounds from the 2020 presidential election are still festering two years after Biden won the state by under 12,000 votes.

Up and down the ballot, the Republican side of the Georgia primary pitted candidates peddling the former president’s election fraud claims against hopefuls who pushed back in defense of the Constitution.

– ‘Inelegant delivery’ – 

The race to be Georgia’s secretary of state is seen as equally consequential as the contest for governor, as these are the officials who oversee elections in the United States.

Democrats fear that, across the country, Trump will be able to install loyalists who can weaponize specious fraud accusations from 2020 to make it harder for his opponents to vote in 2024.

As the man responsible for certifying Georgia’s 2020 election results, Brad Raffensperger was in lockstep with Kemp in pushing back against Trump, making him another key target for the former president’s vengeance.

He defeated Jody Hice, one of more than a dozen Trump-backed candidates across America bidding to become secretary of state and professing to believe the 2020 election was stolen.

With 98 of precincts reporting, Raffensperger had 52 percent of the vote, clearing the 50 percent threshold that allowed him to avoid going into a head-to-head run-off and enabling him to declare victory outright.

In a grueling night for Trump, another of the election deniers he endorsed, John Gordon, lost his challenge to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr.

Biden was the first Democratic presidential candidate since 1992 to win Georgia, while Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff triumphed in runoff elections in January 2021 that wrested control of the US Senate from Republicans.

Warnock cruised through his primary and will face Trump-backed football star Herschel Walker, who had an easy night too, sailing to the Republican nomination for Senate.

Georgia’s Democrats are doing all they can to cement their 2021 gains, headlined by Democratic star campaigner Stacey Abrams, who is unopposed in her bid for governor.

Abrams courted controversy over the weekend with remarks that Georgia is the “worst state in the country to live,” citing its healthcare and crime statistics, rising incarceration rates and falling wages.

At a news conference Tuesday, she attempted to clean up a comment that Republicans have seized on as a sign of her lack of local pride, faulting herself for an “inelegant delivery” of her message.

In a brief concession speech, Perdue backed Kemp in his bid to see off Abrams’s challenge.

“We’re going to make sure Stacey Abrams is not governor of the state,” he said.

Nominating contests are also being held in Minnesota, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas, where a school shooting that left 19 children dead had cast a grim pall over the state’s primary.

Russian troops are advancing in eastern Ukraine, pounding key cities and aiming “to destroy everything there”, President Volodymyr Zelensky has said, as Moscow signalled it was digging in for a long war against its neighbour. 

As the war entered its fourth month on Wednesday, Russian forces were relentlessly bombarding the industrial city of Severodonetsk while attempting its encirclement, a key goal of recent fighting in the Donbas region.

Zelensky mourned the thousands of Ukrainian men and women who have perished since the start of the Russian invasion while renewing calls for heavy weapons from foreign partners, saying arms for Kyiv were “the best investment in stability in the world.”

Sergiy Gaidai, governor of the eastern region of Lugansk, said Severodonetsk was being hammered by air strikes, rockets, artillery and mortars in a bid to solidify control over the province and move further into Ukraine.

“The situation is very difficult and unfortunately it is only getting worse,” Gaidai said, describing what he termed a “full-scale offensive in all directions” in a video on Telegram. 

“The Russian army has decided to completely destroy Severodonetsk. They are simply erasing Severodonetsk from the face of the earth,” he said.

Thousands of troops were sent to capture Lugansk region, Gaidai said, adding that the bombardment of Severodonetsk was so intense it was too late for its 15,000 civilians to leave.

In Moscow, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu made it clear Russia was settling in for a long war.

“We will continue the special military operation until all the objectives have been achieved,” he said, using Moscow’s name for the war.

In his daily address to the nation late Tuesday, Zelensky called the situation in Donbas “extremely difficult”.

“All the strength of the Russian army which they still have was thrown there for the offensive,” Zelensky said. “The occupiers want to destroy everything there.”

Supplying Ukraine with rocket-propelled grenades, tanks, anti-ship missiles and other weapons is “the best investment” in preventing future Russian aggression, Zelensky said.

“The longer this war lasts, the greater will be the price of protecting freedom, not only in Ukraine, but also in the whole free world.”

– ‘Three months of mass heroism’ –

Western funds and weapons have helped Ukraine hold off its neighbour’s advances in many areas, including the capital Kyiv.

Russia is now focused on expanding its gains in eastern Donbas, home to pro-Russian separatists, as well as the southern coast.

In the village of Yakovlivka, 55-year-old Ukrainian soldier Andriy hid in a ditch as shells fired by encroaching Russians whistled past.

“Our guys have stopped firing back,” he whispered after glancing up and down the road.

“We do not want to provoke them, because then the Russians will start shooting at us even harder.”

Speaking to regional counterparts from the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization, Russia’s defence chief Shoigu blamed his country’s slow advance on a “deliberate” attempt to avoid civilian casualties. 

“We are not rushing to meet deadlines,” the secretary of Russia’s Security Council, Nikolai Patrushev, added in an interview.

Zelensky dismissed Moscow’s claims, saying Russia has suffered heavy losses in the war, including nearly 30,000 soldiers.

“These have been three months of war crimes by the Russian occupiers. Three months of shelling, destruction, siege. And three months of mass heroism by the people who are defending their own land, their country.”

But Kyiv says it needs more help.

The head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, said delays in getting arms to the frontline had left Kyiv “catastrophically short of heavy weapons”.

However, he expected a “turning point” by August, he told news outlet Ukrainska Pravda.

The United States, meanwhile, announced that an exemption allowing Moscow to pay foreign debts with dollars in Russia would end at 0401 GMT Wednesday, two days before the country’s next debt service payment was due.

– ‘It is just war’ –

Russia’s Defence Ministry said the waters of the port in Mariupol — a strategic southern city that fell after a devastating siege — had been demined and that operations were under way to “restore the port infrastructure”.

But mayor Vadym Boychenko, speaking to Davos via video-link, warned that 100,000 people were without water, food and electricity, and warned disease risked further fatalities.

About 400 kilometres (240 miles) west of Mariupol, the capital of Ukraine’s Kherson region — which has the same name — appeared to be largely spared the ravages of a war that has left much of the country ruins. 

The region has been fully controlled by Russian forces since early in the war, and Moscow-backed officials continued to push for formal annexation — even as residents expressed concerns about the future.

“People are very apprehensive,” trolleybus driver Alexander Loginov, 47, told AFP from the cabin of his vehicle, during a press trip organised by the Russian defence ministry. 

But day-to-day life remains marked by uncertainty, as Loginov told AFP about the “instability” — especially over payment of salaries as “Ukrainian banks are closing”.

“To be honest, it is just war,” Loginov added, using a term Russia has outlawed in favour of “special military operation”.

“Many people don’t yet understand what has happened.”

burs-ar/wd/md/bgs/cwl/dhc

Republican voters delivered a stark repudiation Tuesday of Donald Trump’s “Big Lie” that the 2020 US election was stolen, backing Georgia Governor Brian Kemp for re-election by a huge margin over a candidate recruited by the former president.

Trump had banked much of his own political capital hand-picking David Perdue to oust Kemp in the nominating contest to compete for the governor’s mansion in November’s midterm elections.

Perdue made Trump’s claims about 2020 a centerpiece of his campaign, in a direct appeal to his endorser’s supporters who continue wrongly to question the validity of the outcome.

But the former senator was forced to concede, in an embarrassing blow for Trump, as the early count showed him trailing by almost 50 points less than 90 minutes after polls closed.

“Four years of the Kemp administration will mean that you keep all of your hard-earned money,” Kemp said in his victory address.

“Your communities will be safe. Your kids will be in school without fear of partisan agendas in the classroom. Parents will have a voice and we’ll keep working to bring good paying jobs to every corner of our state.”

Kemp, frequently the target of Trump’s wrath for refusing to help overturn the election, was always expected to win, but the margin of defeat represents a stinging rebuke of Trump from a state he lost by the narrowest of margins in 2020.

In a grueling night for Trump, another of the election deniers he endorsed, John Gordon, also lost his challenge to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr.

Five states were holding nominating contests for congressional elections that will decide in November which party controls the US Senate and House of Representatives for the remainder of President Joe Biden’s first term.

But all eyes are on Georgia, where wounds from the 2020 presidential election are still festering two years after Biden won the state by under 12,000 votes.

Up and down the ballot, the Republican side of the Georgia primary pitted candidates peddling the former president’s election fraud claims against hopefuls who pushed back in defense of the Constitution.

– ‘Inelegant delivery’ – 

The race to be Georgia’s secretary of state is seen as equally consequential as the contest for governor, as these are the officials who oversee elections in the United States.

Democrats fear that, across the country, Trump will be able to install loyalists who can weaponize specious fraud accusations from 2020 to make it harder for his opponents to vote in 2024.    

As the man responsible for certifying Georgia’s 2020 election results, Brad Raffensperger was in lockstep with Kemp in pushing back against Trump.

He faced Jody Hice, one of more than a dozen Trump-backed candidates across America bidding to become secretary of state and professing to believe the 2020 election was stolen.

With two-thirds of votes counted, Raffensperger was a comfortable 17 points ahead with 51 percent, just above the threshold for avoiding a run-off against Hice.

Biden was the first Democratic presidential candidate since 1992 to win Georgia, while Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff triumphed in runoff elections in January 2021 that wrested control of the US Senate from Republicans.

Warnock cruised through his primary and will face Trump-backed football star Herschel Walker, who had an easy night too, sailing to the Republican nomination for Senate.

Georgia’s Democrats are doing all they can to cement their 2021 gains, headlined by Democratic star campaigner Stacey Abrams, who is unopposed in her bid for governor.

Abrams courted controversy over the weekend with remarks that Georgia is the “worst state in the country to live,” citing its healthcare and crime statistics, rising incarceration rates and falling wages.

At a news conference Tuesday, she attempted to clean up a comment that Republicans have seized on as a sign of her lack of local pride, faulting herself for an “inelegant delivery” of her message.

In a brief concession speech, Perdue backed Kemp in his bid to see off Abrams’s challenge.

“We’re going to make sure Stacey Abrams is not governor of the state,” he said.

Nominating contests are also being held in Minnesota, Alabama, Arkansas and Texas, where a school shooting that left at least 18 children dead had cast a grim pall over the state’s primary.