Ukraine war: We’ve retaken 6,000 sq km from Russia, says Zelensky

 Ukrainian forces have seized even more territory from Russia as they continue their counter-offensive, the country’s president has said.

Volodymyr Zelensky said troops have now retaken more than 6,000 sq km (2,317 sq miles) from Russian control in September, in the east and the south.

The BBC cannot verify these figures.

Russia has admitted losing key cities in the north-eastern Kharkiv region, in what is seen by some military experts as a potential breakthrough in the war.

Moscow describes its troop withdrawal from the region in recent days as a “regrouping” with the aim of focusing on the Luhansk and Donetsk regions in Ukraine’s east.

That claim has been ridiculed even in Russia, with many social media users there describing the stated pull-out as “shameful”.

Speaking later on Monday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Ukrainian forces had made “significant progress” in their counter-offensive, but added that it was too early to predict the outcome.

“The Russians maintain very significant forces in Ukraine as well as equipment and arms and munitions. They continue to use it indiscriminately against not just the Ukrainian armed forces but civilians and civilian infrastructure as we’ve seen,” Mr Blinken said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February. Russia still holds about a fifth of the country.

In his late video address on Monday, President Zelensky said: “From the beginning of September until today, our warriors have already liberated more than 6,000 sq km of the territory of Ukraine – in the east and south”.

“The movement of our troops continues,” he said.

The counter-offensive appears to have been rapid. Last Thursday, President Zelensky said Ukrainian forces had retaken 1,000 sq km, but by Sunday that stated figure had tripled to 3,000 sq km.

Mr Zelensky thanked several of Ukraine’s brigades involved in the counter-offensive, describing their fighters as “true heroes”.

He did not reveal which Ukrainian cities and villages had been liberated.

Ukrainian troops pose with flags in a village retaken from Russian control in the north-eastern Kharkiv region

Russia’s military earlier admitted that its troops had to leave the key cities of Balakliya, Izyum and Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region. Russia now controls only a small eastern part of the region.

Significant – albeit slower – advances by Ukrainian troops have also been reported in the southern Kherson region, which borders with Crimea – a Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014.

UK defence officials say the Ukrainian army’s recent successes will have “significant implications” for Russia’s overall operational design.

However, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has insisted that military operations in Ukraine will continue “until all the tasks that were initially set” have been fulfilled.

Russia says its forces have been carrying out strikes in those areas retaken by Ukraine in recent days.

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Former US President, Donald Trump ‘will not receive invite to Queen’s funeral’

 Donald Trump will reportedly not be invited to the Queen’s funeral next week.

According to Mail Online, the former US president is not expected to be among the mourners at next Monday’s service with numbers limited due to one representative per country and their significant other.

Only current heads of state and their spouses or partners will be invited, meaning Joe and Jill Biden will be among those paying their respects in Westminster Abbey.

The Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office (FCDO) said the abbey will be so packed that it would be impossible to offer more invitations, according to documents seen by Politico.

The guidelines sent to embassies on Saturday night said the department ‘regrets that, because of limited space at the state funeral service and associated events, no other members of the principal guest’s family, staff or entourage may be admitted.’

Heads of state that cannot attend are able to choose someone else as their official representative in their stead.

Biden said on Friday he intended to travel to London for the funeral, despite serving presidents not attending the last two state funerals for Winston Churchill and George VI.

Questions had been raised about whether Trump would attend the service.

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ean-Luc Godard: Legendary French film director dies at 91

 Film director Jean-Luc Godard, who spearheaded the revolutionary French New Wave of cinema, has died at the age of 91.

Godard burst onto the scene with 1960’s À bout de souffle (Breathless), which started a run of acclaimed releases that rewrote the rules of film.

His work brought a new verve and daring to cinema and influenced directors from Martin Scorsese to Quentin Tarantino.

French President Emmanuel Macron said Godard “had the vision of a genius”.

In a tribute on Twitter, Mr Macron wrote: “He was like an apparition in French cinema. Then he became a master of it.

“Jean-Luc Godard, the most iconoclastic of New Wave filmmakers, invented a resolutely modern, intensely free art. We have lost a national treasure, a man who had the vision of a genius.”

Godard’s rich seam of influential films in the 1960s also included Le Mépris (Contempt), Bande à Part (Band of Outsiders) and Alphaville.

Godard started as a film critic before stepping behind the camera with the stylish and edgy Breathless. Its stars Jean Seberg and Jean-Paul Belmondo were glamorous in a new, casual way, while the camera was constantly moving, the editing was swift and bold, and the script semi-improvised.

The director once said: “It was a film that took everything that cinema had done – girls, gangsters, cars – exploded all this and put an end, once and for all, to the old style.”

Jean-Luc Godard with Anna Karina and Jean-Paul Belmondo on the set of Pierrot Le Fou in 1965

That was followed by Le Petit Soldat (The Little Soldier) – although the film was banned until 1963 because of its depiction of government-sanctioned torture.

Its cast included Danish model Anna Karina, who married Godard in 1961 and went on to appear in a string of his most successful films.

She played a nightclub dancer who wants a baby in 1961’s Une Femme est une Femme (A Woman Is A Woman); a young Parisian prostitute in 1962’s Vivre sa vie (My Life to Live); and a gang member in Band of Outsiders in 1965.

Tarantino named his production company A Band Apart, in reference to the latter film’s original French title, and once said Godard was “so influential” to him as a director.

“Godard is one who taught me the fun and the freedom and the joy of breaking rules… I consider Godard to be to cinema what Bob Dylan was to music,” he said.

Jean-Luc Godard directing Brigitte Bardot in 1963’s Contempt

Contempt, from 1963, starring Brigitte Bardot, was named by Scorsese as one of his 10 favourite movies. It is “one of the most moving films of its era” and Godard was “the great modern visual artists of cinema”, the Taxi Driver director wrote in 2014.

Godard’s storylines also mixed up time and space, changing the idea of a fixed narrative. He once said: “A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end – but not necessarily in that order.”

He had more than 100 films to his name in total, also including Une Femme Mariée (1964), Pierrot le fou (1965), Masculin Féminin (1966) and Week-end (1967).

His most recent work was released in 2018, although some thought Godard became wilfully obscure as his career went on.

Godard received an honorary Oscar in 2011, with the dedication reading: “For passion. For confrontation. For a new kind of cinema.”

Godard filming student marches on the streets of Paris in 1968

In a statement on Tuesday, his family said the Franco-Swiss director had died “peacefully at home”. They added: “No official [funeral] ceremony will take place. He will be cremated.”

Former French culture minister Jack Lang told the Reuters news agency: “He filled cinema with poetry and philosophy. His sharp and unique eye made us see the imperceptible.”

Others paying tribute included actor Antonio Banderas, who wrote: “Thank you monsieur Godard for expanding the boundaries of the cinema.”

Baby Driver director Edgar Wright wrote: “RIP Jean-Luc Godard, one of the most influential, iconoclastic film-makers of them all.

“It was ironic that he himself revered the Hollywood studio film-making system, as perhaps no other director inspired as many people to just pick up a camera and start shooting.”

Film critics also discussed his influence.

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Channel migrants: Crossings in 2022 now exceed whole of 2021

 The number of people who have crossed the English Channel in small boats so far this year has now exceeded the total for the whole of 2021.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) said 601 migrants made the crossing on Monday in 19 boats, bringing this year’s total so far to 28,592 people.

In 2021, the total was 28,526 people.

The latest crossings come as the High Court hears a challenge against the government’s plan to send migrants to Rwanda.

The government has been approached for a comment.

The 2022 figure to date is almost double the number of people that had been detected by this point last year, which was just over 14,600.

August saw the highest daily total on record, with 1,295 people crossing in 27 boats.

In April, former home secretary Priti Patel signed what she described as a “world-first agreement” with Rwanda in an attempt to deter migrants from making the journey to the UK.

However, several asylum seekers, the Public and Commercial Services Union and charities Care4Calais, Detention Action and Asylum Aid are embroiled in a court case with the Home Office as they challenge its legality.

The first deportation flight – due to take off on 14 June – was grounded amid legal challenges.

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You are God who can change a chicken-seller to president’

 A prayer has been made for President William Ruto and his deputy Rigathi Gachagua.

Bishop Mark Kariuki has dedicated the presidency and the instruments of power handed over during the swearing-in ceremony.

The bishop during the prayer said God had showcased his might by elevating President Ruto who was a road-side chicken seller.

He then handed the president a Bible.

The president, his deputy and their spouses knelt on the dais as the prayer was made.

The two couples are prayerful and the president has in the past said he was “prayed into presidency”.

The deputy president’s wife is an ordained pastor having retired as a banker.

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Senegal leads West Africa in women MPs

 Senegal now has the highest proportion of female MPs in West Africa.

Following July’s elections, 73 out of 165 parliamentary seats are held by women. By comparison, women hold just 4% of parliamentary seats in Nigeria and 26% in Niger.

Senegal ranks fourth in Africa and 18th in the world for gender parity in parliament, ahead of Switzerland, France, Britain and the US, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union in Geneva.

A 2010 law requiring “absolute gender parity” in all elective institutions is the driving force behind the country’s high share of women in office.

According to a UN report, outside Senegal, only 15 of 111 elected or appointed parliamentary or ministerial positions were filled by women in West Africa and the Sahel between December and June.

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Retired Deputy Superintendent of Police Caught Having Sex With A Mentally-ill Girl

 

NIGERIA: A retired Deputy Superintendent of Police identified as Gamy Ugwu was paraded after he was allegedly caught having sexual intercourse with a mentally-ill girl in Enugu-Ezike in Igbo Eze North local government area of Enugu State.

Chijinkem Ugwuanyi, who disclosed this via Facebook on Monday, September 12, said the incident happened in Amufie community.

“A Retired Deputy Superintendent Of Police from Amufie named Gamy Ugwu was caught having affair with an imbecile Called Ugo Nwa Eke in Amufie Community.” he wrote.

Members of the community, Eze Hillary Oluchukwu and Nnaemeka Omeh, also confirmed the incident on Sunday.

“The said man in the pictures raped/slept with a mad woman beside him. The man is a retired police officer in Umuopeke.” one said.

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Queen Elizabeth’s Funeral: Foreign Leaders Banned From Attending With Private Jets

 The funeral of the late Queen Elizabeth II has been scheduled for Monday, September 19, 2022.

Ahead of the funeral, the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office has issued strict protocols for attending foreign heads of state and officials.

According to multiple reports by UK media, the funeral for attending foreign officials is by strict invitation with numbers limited to a head of state and their spouse or a senior government official in their stead.

“Multiple and comprehensive layers of security will be in place across London and at all the official venues used for the state funeral and associated events,” portions of FCDO documents quoted by the press state.

As part of the arrangements, the office has also warned foreign leaders to if possible, arrive in the UK onboard commercial flights as London’s Heathrow Airport will be closed to private jets.

As part of the arrangements, heads of state have been asked to gather at a site in West London where they will be bussed to Westminster Abbey for the funeral. The heads of state will be returned to the same location for their departure after the funeral.

The FCDO recommended that arriving heads of state fly to less busy airports around London and further warned that the use of helicopters to transfer from airports to other venues is banned due to the expected congestion in the region’s airspace.

The directive implies that foreign heads of state aside from being unable to fly to London in their private jets will not be able to use their official cars for the funeral.

Westminster Abbey where the Queen’s funeral will be held has an official capacity of 2,200 and is expected to be overfilled on the day of the funeral, a situation which has informed the decision to admit a limited number of foreign officials.

The FCDO in its protocol document said it “regrets that, because of limited space at the state funeral service and associated events, no other members of the principal guest’s family, staff or entourage may be admitted”.

Meanwhile, opposition Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has described the directive as welcoming and timely to many Ghanaians.

The MP has for several months been monitoring and reporting on President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s foreign travels.

Mr Ablakwa has accused the president of living a profligate lifestyle with his use of expensive chartered private jets for foreign travels instead of the state’s presidential jet.

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