Judges at the top UN court on Wednesday found that Russia violated elements of a UN anti-terrorism treaty, but declined to rule on allegations brought by Kyiv that Moscow was responsible for the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014.

In the same ruling, judges at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found that Russia had breached an anti-discrimination treaty by failing to support Ukrainian language education in Crimea after its 2014 annexation of the peninsula.

The decisions were a legal setback for Kyiv. The court rejected Ukraine’s requests to order reparations for both violations and only ordered Russia to comply with the treaties.

Ukraine’s representative Anton Korynevych stressed the judgment was important for Kyiv because it did establish Russia violated international law.

“This is the first time that officially, legally Russia is called a violator of international law,” he told journalists after the ruling.

Ukraine had filed the lawsuit at the ICJ, also known as the World Court, in 2017, accusing Russia of violating an anti-terrorism treaty by funding pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine.

The court’s judges said Moscow violated the UN’s anti-terrorism treaty by not investigating plausible allegations that some funds were sent from Russia to Ukraine to possibly fund terrorist activities.

The 16-judge panel ordered Russia to investigate any plausible allegations of terrorism financing but turned down a request by Kyiv for reparations.

The court declined to rule on the downing of MH17, saying violations of funding terrorism only applied to monetary and financial support, not to supplying weapons or training as alleged by Ukraine.

Ukraine had argued that Russia supplied the missile system that shot down the aircraft, but it had not alleged financial support in that instance.

In a hearing at the court in The Hague last June, Russia dismissed Ukraine’s allegations that it funded and controlled pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine as fiction and “blatant lies”.

In the case, which has taken almost seven years, Kyiv had accused Russia of equipping and funding pro-Russian forces, including rebels who shot down MH17 in July 2014, killing all 298 passengers and crew.

In November 2022, a Dutch court sentenced two Russians and a Ukrainian in absentia to life imprisonment for their role in the disaster.

In Crimea, Ukraine had said Russia was trying to erase the culture of ethnic Tatars and Ukrainians. The court dismissed all of the claims related to the Tatars but found Moscow did not do enough to support Ukrainian language education.

The court’s judgments are final and without appeal, but it has no way to enforce its rulings.

On Friday, the ICJ will rule in another case in which Ukraine has accused Moscow of falsely applying the 1948 Genocide Convention to justify its Feb. 24, 2022, invasion.

A region of the moon that’s at the center of a new international space race because it may contain water ice could be less hospitable than once thought, new research has found.

Interest in the lunar south pole spiked last year, when India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission made the first successful soft landing in the area, just days after Russia’s Luna-25 spacecraft crashed en route to attempt the same feat. NASA has selected the region as the landing site for its Artemis III mission, which could mark the return of astronauts to the moon as soon as 2026, and China also has plans to create future habitats there.

But now a study funded by NASA is ringing an alarm bell: As the moon’s core gradually cools and shrinks, its surface develops creases — like a grape shriveling into a raisin — that create “moonquakes” that can last for hours, as well as landslides. Much like the rest of the natural satellite’s surface, the area of the south pole that is the subject of so much interest is prone to these seismic phenomena, potentially posing a threat to future human settlers and equipment.

“This is not to alarm anyone and certainly not to discourage exploration of that part of the south pole of the moon,” said the study’s lead author, Thomas R. Watters, a senior scientist emeritus in the National Air and Space Museum’s Center for Earth and Planetary Studies, “but to raise the caution that the moon is not this benign place where nothing is happening.”

Finding the source of moonquakes

The moon has shrunk by about 150 feet in circumference over the last few million years — a significant number in geological terms but too small to cause any ripple effect on Earth or to tidal cycles, according to researchers.

On the lunar surface, however, it’s a different story. Despite what its appearance might suggest, the moon still has a hot interior, which makes it seismically active.

“There is an outer core that’s molten and is cooling off,” Watters said. “As it cools, the moon shrinks, the interior volume changes and the crust has to adjust to that change — it’s a global contraction, to which tidal forces on the Earth also contribute.”

Because the moon’s surface is brittle, this pulling generates cracks, which geologists call faults. “The moon is thought of as being this geologically dead object where nothing has happened for billions of years, but that couldn’t be more far from the truth,” Watters said. “These faults are very young and things are happening. We’ve actually detected landslides that have occurred during the time that the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has been in orbit around the moon.”

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, launched in 2009, and it’s mapping the moon’s surface with various instruments. In the new study, published January 25 in The Planetary Science Journal, Watters and his colleagues used data collected by LRO to link a powerful moonquake — detected with instruments left by Apollo astronauts more than 50 years ago — to a series of faults in the lunar south pole.

“We knew from the Apollo seismic experiment, which were four seismometers that operated for a period of about seven years, that there were these shallow moonquakes, but we didn’t really know what the source was,” Watters added. “We also knew that the largest of the shallow moonquakes detected by the Apollo seismometers was located near the south pole. It kind of became a sort of a detective story to try to figure out what the source was, and it turns out that these young faults are the best suspect.”

The strongest recorded quake was the equivalent of magnitude 5.0. On Earth, that would be considered moderate, but the moon’s lower gravity would make it feel worse, Watters said.

“On the Earth, you have a much stronger gravity keeping you attached to the surface. On the moon, it’s much smaller, so even a little bit of ground acceleration is going to potentially pop you off your feet, if you’re walking along,” he said. “That kind of shaking can really start throwing things around in a low G environment.”

Moonquakes: Short-term vs. long-term implications

The findings of the study will not affect the Artemis III landing region selection process, and that’s due to the scope and duration of the mission, according to study coauthor and NASA planetary scientist Renee Weber.

“This is because estimating how often a specific region experiences a moonquake is difficult to do accurately, and like earthquakes, we can’t predict moonquakes,” Weber said. “Strong shallow moonquakes are infrequent and pose a low risk to short-term missions on the lunar surface.”

NASA has identified 13 Artemis III candidate landing regions near the lunar south pole, she added, using criteria such as the ability to land safely in the region, the potential to meet science objectives, launch window availability and conditions such as terrain, communications and lighting. As part of the mission, two astronauts will spend about a week living and working on the lunar surface.

However, Weber said, for a long-term human presence on the moon, the site selection process could indeed factor in geographic characteristics such as proximity to tectonic features and terrain.

Like flashlights in the moon

Moonquakes could indeed be a problem for future manned landing missions, said Yosio Nakamura, a professor emeritus of geophysics at the University of Texas at Austin, who was among the researchers who first looked at the data collected by the Apollo seismic stations.

However, Nakamura, who was not involved with the study, disagrees about the cause of the quakes, and said Apollo data shows the phenomena originate tens of kilometers below the surface.

“We still don’t know what causes shallow moonquakes, but it is not the sliding fault near the surface,” he said. “Regardless of what causes those quakes, it is true that they pose a potential threat to future landing missions, and we need more data about them.”

Regardless of the underlying cause, the potential danger moonquakes pose to astronauts will be limited by the fact that — at least in the near future — humans will be on the moon for short periods of time, a few days at most, according to Allen Husker, a research professor of geophysics at the California Institute of Technology who was also not involved with the study.

“It is very unlikely that a large moonquake will happen while they are there. However, it is good to know that these seismic sources (causing the quakes) exist. They can be an opportunity to better study the moon as we do on the Earth with earthquakes,” Husker said. “By the time there is an actual moon base, we should have a much better idea of the actual seismic hazard with upcoming missions.”

That sentiment is shared by Jeffrey Andrews-Hanna, an associate professor of planetary science at the University of Arizona, who also didn’t participate in the work. “Moonquakes are an incredible tool for doing science,” he said in an email. “They are like flashlights in the lunar interior that illuminate its structure for us to see. Studying moonquakes at the south pole will tell us more about the Moon’s interior structure as well as its present-day activity.”

Rumors of the meeting, and Zaluzhny’s dismissal, exploded around Kyiv on Monday evening, lent credibility by a rift widely understood to have opened up between the president and his commander-in-chief following the failure of the Ukrainian counteroffensive last year.

Tensions are said to have risen in particular when Zaluzhny described the war with Russia as a stalemate, in an interview and essay with The Economist magazine in November.

And in his daily evening address Monday, Zelensky himself made no reference at all to his army chief.

But according to one of the sources, and in line with other reports, at a small gathering at his office on Monday – also attended by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov – the president declared he had “made a decision to dismiss the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.”

In a conversation described as “calm,” Zelensky then proceeded to offer Zaluzhny a different position, which Zaluzhny declined.

Ukraine’s president then underlined his decision, saying the fact Zaluzhny had turned down the new role did not change the fact he was being removed from his current post.

One of them is the current head of the Defense Intelligence Directorate, Kyrylo Budanov, a 38-year-old general known to have strong ties with Zelensky and seen as representing a new generation of military leaders.

“We are in a war, and all sides are using all available means, including information warfare,” the military spy chief added.

One of Ukraine’s most popular leaders

Despite the failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive to make any significant progress in rolling back Russian forces in the south and the east of the country, Zaluzhny remains one of the most popular leaders in the country.

A poll published by the Kyiv Institute of Sociology in December found 88% of Ukrainians supported the top general. Zelensky’s approval rating, though also high, was considerably lower at 62%.

The poll was conducted after differences between the two leaders had apparently broken into the open over the prosecution of the war.

“Just like in the First World War we have reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate,” Zaluzhny had written in The Economist in November as it became clear that Russia’s deeply-laid minefields, and overwhelming heavy artillery fire, had largely prevented significant Ukrainian success in the counteroffensive.

“There will most likely be no deep and beautiful breakthrough,” but instead an equilibrium of devastating losses and destruction, the army chief added.

Those comments drew immediate criticism from the president’s office.

“If I were in the military, the last thing I would do is to comment to the press, to the public, on what is happening at the front [and] what might happen at the front … because then we will facilitate the aggressor’s work,” Ihor Zhovkva, deputy head of the president’s office, said on Ukrainian television at the time.

Zelensky did not openly criticize Zaluzhny, but told a live news conference in December: “I am waiting for very concrete things on the battlefield. The strategy is clear: We have an understanding of our actions. I want to see details,” Reuters reported.

Launched in June, Ukraine’s counteroffensive was its main effort to drive Russian forces back from the territories they have occupied since 2022, particularly in the south of the country. Ukraine had aimed to push south from the town of Orikhiv towards the Sea of Azov, splitting Russia’s forces in two and cutting its land bridge to Crimea.

But Ukraine’s gains were modest. Its forces attempted to push from Orikhiv towards Tokmak, but only made it as far as Robotyne, a little over 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) south.

Ukraine’s lack of progress led to a call from its armed forces at the end of December for a huge mobilization effort of up to half a million new conscripts. The request is currently before parliament.

“He is a worthy general. Our government wants to overthrow him because he is not very convenient for them,” the soldier said, adding, “It seems like ‘Zelensky’s guys’ sold us out a long time ago.”

Aid to Ukraine is frozen in US Congress, and Kyiv could be dealing with a Trump presidency more sympathetic to Moscow. But Ukraine’s spy chief isn’t losing any sleep over the US.

Trump “is an experienced person. He has fallen many times and gotten back up again. And this is a very serious trait,” Budanov said of the former president who has made no secret of his desire to cut US support for Ukraine and whose allies in Congress are opposing efforts to authorize more aid.

In a wide-ranging interview, the military spy chief made clear Ukraine’s desperate need for more ammunition and weapons to hold back Russian assaults, even as he dismissed the risk of the US leaving Ukraine out in the cold.

“We are expecting a positive decision anyway,” Budanov said of the US debate over aid, “To say that [Trump] and the Republican Party are lovers of the Russian Federation is complete nonsense.”

Trump boasted this month on social media that he would rather trust Putin over some American intelligence officers, and famously backed the Russian leader during his presidency.

As head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, whose strength lies in intelligence-gathering and secretive special forces raids, Budanov has gained a reputation as being a man of few words but one who delivers results.

His agency has claimed notable successes, including raids on the Russian-occupied Crimea and attacks on Russian airfields, inflicting embarrassing wounds on the Kremlin.

Earlier in his career, Budanov fought and was injured on the front lines in eastern Ukraine, shortly after Russia first invaded its southern neighbor in 2014.

A figure of ire for the Kremlin, Budanov has been the target of Russian assassination at least 10 times in his career, the Ukrainians say. Late last year, they may have got close to him. His wife was hospitalized with apparent heavy metals poisoning, according to Ukrainian and western officials, in an attack that many suspected to be Russia’s doing.

Known to have strong ties with President Zelensky, the 38-year-old is seen to represent a new generation of military leaders.

At the same time, his utterances, and carefully cultivated public profile, have attracted some criticism. An enigmatic video appearance ahead of the largely stalled counteroffensive is seen now as one of several messages from Ukrainian officials that served to raise expectations too high about what Ukraine’s armed forces could achieve.

With rumors swirling that Zelensky could soon sack Valeriy Zaluzhny, the popular commander-in-chief of the army, Budanov is seen as a possible replacement. Budanov would not be drawn on the reports, saying “I personally have no conflict with anyone.”

Military priorities

Amid fierce Russian assaults along Ukraine’s frontlines, ammunition shortages and exhausted troops, Ukraine’s spy chief has one clear priority: more Western support.

Artillery systems – howitzers – were top of the list, with Ukraine needing a “sharp increase” in the number of guns, Budanov said, regardless of their age and type, as years of fighting take their toll on Ukraine’s long-range cannons.

Ammunition is vital too, he said, as “shells are one of the most decisive factors in this war.”

“Not so much the quality as the quantity,” he added. Ukraine has never managed to outgun Russian firepower, even after Moscow turned to North Korea to keep its ammunition flowing.

But Ukraine is holding its own in the air above the frontlines, the spy chief said. With Russia continually learning from its combat experiences, the trend is for even greater use of unmanned drones on and above Ukraine’s battlefields.

“It is precisely in unmanned systems that we are more or less equal,” Budanov said. Ukrainian social media is bursting with footage from frontline troops showing drones spying on, attacking and even capturing Russian troops, although Moscow uses many of the same tactics.

Kyiv has also stepped up long-range attacks on targets inside Russia, with explosions reported at infrastructure sites outside major cities  far from the Ukrainian border. Russian authorities claimed to have foiled dozens of Ukrainian drone and missile attacks since the new year.

But as Ukraine’s long-held hopes for F-16 jets come to fruition – with Kyiv’s pilots already training on the aircraft – Budanov echoed Ukraine’s newest request.

He wants to see ground-attack aircraft like the American A-10 in Ukrainian hands. “This is what can really help inflict a military defeat” on Russia, he said of the aging aircraft.

Although decades old, the jet – famous for its prowess against Iraqi armor in the first Gulf War – is still lauded by its pilots and US troops, even as US Congress has looked to ax it from the US Air Force’s arsenal.

New jets may be a long shot with aid to Ukraine entangled as part of a greater compromise on US immigration policy, which has been opposed by Trump and his allies in Congress.

Look to the future

Budanov estimates there are more than half a million Russian troops in the occupied Ukrainian territories, but does not see much potential for movement on the front lines in the short term.

But he suggested that attacks on Russian infrastructure may grow. While refusing to acknowledge Ukrainian involvement in drone attacks in Russia, he said such operations were “quite possible.”

“Hypothetically, there is a plan according to which all this happens,” he said. “And I believe that this plan includes all the major critical infrastructure facilities and military infrastructure facilities of the Russian Federation.”

Now, Russian civilians, he said, finally “see the real picture [of war]. They see burning oil depots, destroyed buildings in factories and plants, and so on. This is all beneficial.” he said.

On Wednesday, Ukraine and Russia exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war, in the first swap following the crash of a Russian IL-76 transport aircraft. Moscow claimed Ukraine shot down the plane, which they said was carrying dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war.

Budanov was resolute in his confidence in a full victory for Ukraine over Russia, despite the public concerns over the fatigue of Ukrainian troops, Russia’s advantage in domestic military production and the lack of movement on the frontlines.

The next six months will be interesting, he said, with that period seeing the end of Russia’s ongoing push along the frontlines.

For Budanov, the war will only end one way.

“The establishment of justice – This is how it will end,” he said, “With the return of what was lost.”

Russia and Ukraine have exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war, in the first such swap since the deadly crash of a Russian military plane that Moscow claimed was carrying 65 captured Ukrainian soldiers.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said 207 Ukrainian service members were returned on Wednesday, while the Russian Defense Ministry said 195 Russian military personnel had been received.

“Ours are at home. 207 guys,” Zelensky said, adding that almost half of those returned were “defenders of Mariupol,” the southern Ukrainian city that was brutally besieged in the early weeks of the war.

Zelensky said 50 prisoner swaps had now taken place since Russia launched its full-scale invasion nearly two years ago, through which Ukraine had brought 3035 soldiers home. “We will do everything to return each and every one of them. We have not forgotten about anyone. We are looking for every single name,” he said.

Wednesday’s exchange was the first since the mysterious crash of a Russian IL-76 plane on January 24 in Russia’s Belgorod region, which neighbors eastern Ukraine.

Moscow claimed the plane was transporting dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war, while Kyiv said it was carrying Russian missiles to be used in further strikes on Ukraine.

Russia initially failed to produce visual evidence to back up its claims that soldiers had perished in the crash. Ukraine later said it had intelligence suggesting only five bodies were delivered from the crash site to a morgue in Belgorod, which Yusov said matched the number of crew members on the plane. A number of Ukrainian officials accused Russia of falsely suggesting that Ukraine had inadvertently killed dozens of its own soldiers.

Kyiv officials said last Friday that the names of the 65 POWs in Russia’s list tallied with the list of POWs scheduled to be returned to Ukraine as part of the exchange planned on the day of the crash. But Ukraine’s intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said there was still no reliable information as to who might have been on board the downed Russian plane.

Speaking after Wednesday’s prisoner exchange, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed the IL-76 plane had been downed by a US Patriot missile system.

“The plane was shot down – this has already been established with certainty – by the American Patriot system. This has already been established through examination,” Putin said in a meeting focused on his election campaign. He called on international authorities to conduct their own investigations.

Kyiv has not claimed responsibility for the downing of the plane. While the Il-76 plane would have been within the range of a Patriot deployed close to Ukraine’s northern border, Ukraine has consistently said it will not use Western-donated missiles beyond its own internationally-recognized territory.

Putin stressed that Russia would not halt prisoner exchanges despite the plane crash.

“We need to pick up our guys,” he said. “We have thousands, they [Ukrainians] have several dozen, maybe hundreds [of POWs]. But we will still take our guys if the Ukrainian side is ready for this, and they give a signal that they are ready.”

Neither Ukraine’s nor Russia’s statements on Wednesday’s prisoner exchange mentioned the crash.

The head of Zelensky’s office, Andriy Yermak, said the swap was “the second major exchange after a long break.” Alongside the defenders of Mariupol, he said the returned prisoners included “soldiers who were at Azovstal, Zmiinyi Snake Island, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Kherson and Sumy directions.”

Russia’s Defense Ministry said the Russian soldiers released would be transported by military transport aircraft to Moscow for treatment and rehabilitation.

Three foreign-born residents in Japan are suing the country’s government over alleged racial profiling, highlighting an ongoing debate about Japanese identity and nationality.

The plaintiffs filed the lawsuit in the Tokyo National Court and held a news conference with their lawyers on Monday, according to public broadcaster NHK.

The suit alleges they were questioned by police on the basis of their race, skin color, nationality, and other factors, constituting discrimination in violation of Japan’s constitution, NHK reported.

They are seeking 3 million yen (about $20,355) in compensation per person from the national government, the Tokyo metropolitan government, and the Aichi prefectural government.

One plaintiff came to Japan from India after marrying his wife, and has lived there for more than 20 years, NHK reported. Since then, he has been repeatedly stopped and questioned by police officers on the street, sometimes twice a day. It got so bad he became afraid to leave the house at times, he said, according to NHK.

Another plaintiff, a Pakistani-born Japanese citizen, said during the news conference, “I think that people in Japan have the image that foreigners who look like foreigners commit crimes.”

“I have been cooperating with (police) because I thought it was important for maintaining public safety, but when it happened not once but more than 10 times, I began to have doubts indeed,” he added, according to NHK.

The third plaintiff is an American-born man who said he hoped to raise awareness of the issue among the Japanese population, according to Reuters.

The Tokyo government also declined to comment on the case, but said it had enacted a human rights ordinance in 2019, provided relevant training for its police, and was “conducting educational activities to respect the human rights of citizens, including foreign nationals, and to eliminate discrimination.”

Japan is an ethnically homogenous country with comparatively low levels of immigration, which in recent years has prompted authorities to push for more foreign residents and workers to plug gaps left by an aging population.

Japan has struggled to balance its conservative views on immigration with the need for new and younger workers, though a 2018 Pew survey showed that 59% of Japanese people believed immigrants would make the country stronger.

The country’s high ethnic homogeneity means people who look different can attract unwanted attention, and feel othered even if they identify as Japanese – especially those with darker skin.

For instance, people who are “hafu” – the Japanese word for “half,” referring to those who are ethnically half Japanese – have described being treated as foreigners even if they are Japanese nationals.

A number of controversies over the years have highlighted these prejudices, and raised questions about beauty standards and what it means to be Japanese. In 2019, noodle company Nissin apologized after being accused of “whitewashing” tennis star Naomi Osaka – who is of Japanese and Haitian heritage – in an animated ad that depicted her with pale skin, brown hair and Caucasian features.

And just this month, a nationwide beauty pageant made waves by crowning Ukrainian-born model Karolina Shiino as the “Foremost Beauty of All Japanese Women.” Some critics questioned whether someone without Japanese ancestry could represent the country’s beauty ideals.

But Shiino, a naturalized citizen who has lived in Nagoya since she was 5 years old and speaks fluent Japanese, said she considered herself “absolutely Japanese,” and wanted to be recognized as such.

“After all, we live in an era of diversity — where diversity is needed,” she said.

Boris Nadezhdin, an anti-war candidate vying for the Russian presidency, said Wednesday he had submitted the signatures required to be listed on the presidential election ballot, potentially allowing him to stand against Vladimir Putin in March.

Nadezhdin announced he had delivered 105,000 signatures, the maximum allowed by law, to the Central Election Commission in Moscow, which now has 10 days to review the signatures.

“I want to say a huge thank you to those who believed in us. Many thanks to those dozens, even hundreds of thousands of people who stood in queues throughout our huge country, in 75 regions of the country, in more than 120 or 130 cities, collecting signatures,” Nadezhdin said at a press conference. He said he had collected 208,000 signatures in total.

“This is my pride, the many days of work of thousands of people without sleep,” Nadezhdin wrote on Telegram, alongside a picture of himself standing in front of a stack of cardboard boxes.

Thousands have lined up in cities across Russia and elsewhere in Europe since early January to give their signatures in support of Nadezhdin, with volunteers collecting expats’ signatures in cities from London and Paris to Georgia’s capital Tbilisi.

Putin announced late last year that he will seek a fifth presidential term, which could see him retain power until at least 2030. While Nadezhdin’s candidacy could represent little more than Putin’s need to fashion the appearance of democracy in Russia, his collection of the required signatures is a measure of the anti-war sentiment in the country as its full-scale invasion of Ukraine nears its second anniversary.

“This is the only candidate that wants to stop the military action on someone else’s territory,” said a voter called Anatoly as he waited in line to give his signature in a snow-swept Moscow.

Exacting standards

Nadezhdin, a 60-year-old former State Duma MP running as an independent from the Civic Initiative Party, has positioned himself as the only presidential candidate willing openly to oppose Russia’s war in Ukraine. His manifesto describes the invasion as a “fatal mistake.”

People have been arrested for far less in Russia. How has Nadezhdin’s campaign been able to get this far? The question confounds even the politician himself.

He has garnered the support of other prominent Russian opposition figures, including members of jailed Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny’s team and exiled oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who urged Russian citizens to add their signatures for Nadezhdin.

Although Nadezhdin has gathered the requisite number of signatures, his campaign will be challenged by the exacting and often arbitrary standards imposed by Russia’s CEC. To formally register as a candidate, the CEC stipulates no more than 2,500 votes can come from a single region. Previous candidacies have been refused on a technicality.

Yekaterina Duntsova, another independent candidate who openly decried the war in Ukraine, was in December rejected by the Central Election Commission, citing alleged errors in her campaign group’s registration documents. Duntsova later called on people to support Nadezhdin’s candidacy.

In January, shortly after expressing her intent to create her own political party, Duntsova reported being detained briefly by traffic police and randomly drug-tested. Opponents of the Kremlin have often alleged the fabrication of criminal charges through the planting of drugs.

Nadezhdin reported last week that a “denial of service” attack had briefly crashed his official website.

The Kremlin has expressed confidence that Putin has the overwhelming support of Russian citizens ahead of the election to be held on March 15-17 in which he is hoping to secure another six-year term.

For the first time, African music will have its own category at the Grammys. The Recording Academy will showcase three new categories for this year’s awards, including “Best African Music Performance” — featuring some of Afrobeats’ global superstars.

“By introducing these three new categories, we are able to acknowledge and appreciate a broader array of artists,” said Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr., in a press release last year to announce the categories, which also include Best Pop Dance Recording and Best Alternative Jazz Album. “We are excited to honor and celebrate the creators and recordings in these categories, while also exposing a wider range of music to fans worldwide.”

The addition of the Best African Music Performance category follows a meteoric rise in the global popularity of Afrobeats. On Spotify alone, Afrobeats streams have grown over 550% since 2017, according to the streaming platform, making it one of the “fastest growing genres.”

Ahead of the 2024 Grammy Awards on February 4 in Los Angeles, here’s what to know about the five Best African Music Performance nominees poised to make history.

Arya Starr

Oyinkansola Sarah Aderibigbe, known as Ayra Starr, is nominated for her hit “Rush,” on her debut studio album “19 & Dangerous.” The song charted globally, went viral with a dance challenge on TikTok, was listed on former US President Barack Obama’s annual playlist for 2022, and currently has over 300 million streams on Spotify and almost 300 million views on YouTube. Signed to Mavin Records, the 21-year-old Afropop singer has collaborated with Kelly Rowland, Stormzy and fellow Nigerian stars Tiwa Savage and Wizkid.

Asake & Olamide

Tyla

South African Tyla, 21, is nominated for her massive hit “Water,” which spawned a viral dance movement after its release in 2023. The singer released her first single “Getting Late” in 2019 and has been on an upward trajectory since. She has described her sound as “Popiano” — a fusion of South Africa’s Amapiano genre and pop music. “Water” is the first single from her debut studio album “Tyla” and is the highest charting song by a South African solo artist on the Billboard Hot 100, debuting at No. 67 and rising all the way to No. 10.

Davido, featuring Musa Keys

Burna Boy

Concern is mounting for thousands of sheep and cattle stranded off the coast of Australia after authorities ordered the Israeli-owned ship transporting the live cargo to turn around over fears it could be targeted by Houthi rebels in the Red Sea.

More than 16,000 animals are aboard the MV Bahijah anchored off Western Australia, where sweltering heat is adding to pressure on the Australian government to decide whether to re-export the live cargo or allow the vessel back to dock following more than three weeks at sea.

The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry said on Wednesday it was considering a request from the exporter to offload some of the animals, before re-exporting the remainder.

Animal welfare advocates say they should be offloaded as a matter of urgency.

Australia’s live export trade has long been a point of friction between the industry and those who say it prioritizes revenue over animal welfare.

The Australian government has pledged to end the live export of sheep but has yet to give a timetable about when that will happen.

A long journey

The MV Bahijah left the port of Fremantle in Western Australia on January 5 for the Middle East, according to a statement from the Australian government.

A crisis has enveloped the region’s vital Red Sea shipping lane in recent weeks, as Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels attack commercial vessels in what they say is retaliation against Israel for its military campaign in Gaza.

Fifteen days into the ship’s voyage, a request to divert the vessel around Africa, as other ships have done to evade Houthi missiles and drones, was rejected. 
 
“To ensure the health and welfare of the livestock on the MV Bahijah, the department directed the exporter that the consignment be immediately returned to Australia,” said a government statement on January 20.

Earlier this week, the government said it was working with the exporter on a plan, but by Wednesday, as summer temperatures rose, no decision had been made.

John Hassell, president of the Western Australian Farmers Federation (WAFarmers), which represents the state’s agricultural industry, said a decision should have been made days ago.

“I would have thought the department should have had its stuff sorted out well before it got here,” he said. “If the animals are in good nick, if there’s no disease if there’s plenty of space, we’ll (resupply the ship) and turn it away,” he said. “It should have been gone by now.”

“I’m comfortable that the sheep are in the shade sitting down, chewing their cud in the warm parts of the day and eating when it’s cooler, like they do on the farm,” Hassell said.

“Grave” concerns

However, Suzanne Fowler, Chief Science Officer with the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), said it’s a matter of urgency that all animals are offloaded.

“These animals have now been on board the ship for a minimum of 26 days. The temperature in Perth is starting to touch 40 degrees (102 Fahrenheit) today,” she said.

“The evidence tells us that the welfare of the animals is only going to get worse and worse over the coming days due to the amount of time they’ve spent on the ship. So, it’s very urgent and we couldn’t be more gravely concerned.”

Hassell, from WAFarmers, said offloading the animals would only cause them more stress.

If allowed to disembark, the animals would be governed by Australia’s strict biosecurity system, which is designed to assure importing countries that the country’s livestock is disease-free.

Mark Harvey-Sutton, CEO of the Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council, said any animals taken off the boat would be placed into quarantine before being re-exported or killed in an Australian abattoir.

“They would essentially be in quarantine indefinitely until a market was found for them. There’s no two weeks quarantine and you’re out sort of thing.”

Hassell said the only reason some animals would be offloaded would be to create space for the return journey.

“If the animals have gotten bigger and fatter on the trip over and require more space, then that’s why they’ll be offloaded,” he said.

The RSPCA has requested permission for an independent veterinarian to board the ship to assess the animals.

Fowler said while the livestock may not be showing signs of illness now, it’s only a matter of time.

“The stress of the animals is only going to yield in the coming days and that sense of fatigue where they can’t cope anymore, will only worsen,” she said. A lot of these diseases you won’t see until it’s too late.”

A Thai court on Wednesday ordered the kingdom’s most popular political party to end its campaign to amend the country’s notoriously strict royal defamation law, dashing its supporters hopes for reform of the powerful monarchy.

The Constitutional Court in Bangkok ruled the progressive Move Forward Party, which won the most seats in last year’s election, violated the constitution through its campaign to amend the lese majeste law.

It ruled Move Forward and its leaders, including former prime ministerial hopeful Pita Limjaroenrat, sought to overthrow the constitutional monarchy through their actions.

The ruling is considered a blow to the Southeast Asian country’s reform movement and the millions of young people who delivered a crushing defeat to the conservative, military-backed establishment by voting for change.

And analysts say it opens the door for further prosecutions to be brought, which could ultimately see Thailand’s most successful party at the last election dissolved, and bans and criminal charges levied at its leaders.

In its ruling, the court said many Move Forward lawmakers had campaigned to abolish the lese majeste law, face charges under the royal defamation legislation, or used their position to bail out others charged under it.

The court ordered the party to “stop any act, opinion expression via speech, writing, publishing or advertisement or conveying any message in other forms” with the aim to abolish or amend the law.

The ruling could now ensure that no party or person would legally be able to push for amendments to lese majeste, known as Section 112, without violating the constitution.

“This would effectively mean that the lese majeste law would become untouchable,” said Munin Pongsapan, associate professor at Thammasat University’s Faculty of Law. “The only way to amend it would be to get rid of the current constitution and draft a new one that reduces the Constitutional Court’s power and jurisdiction.”

Munin added that such a ruling “would severely violate the constitution itself that it meddles with the parliament’s sovereign legislative power.”

But Move Forward lawmaker Wiroj Lakkhanaadisorn said on social media platform X that the reform movement would continue whatever happened to the party.

“Regarding party dissolution, I have never been worried, I would say, I simply shrug my shoulders since in my heart the word ‘party’ has already become an ideology. Dissolved or not, we will continue,” he said.

Thailand has some of the world’s strictest lese majeste laws, and criticizing the king, queen, or heir apparent can lead to a maximum 15-year prison sentence for each offense — which makes even talking about the royal family fraught with risk.

Sentences for those convicted under lese majeste can be decades long and hundreds of people have been prosecuted in recent years.

Earlier this month, a Thai appeal court extended a man’s prison sentence to a record 50 years for insulting the monarchy, in what is believed to be the toughest penalty ever imposed under the lese majeste law.

Move Forward pledged to reduce lese majeste sentences and limit who can bring forward a case. Anyone – including ordinary citizens – can bring lese majeste charges on behalf of the king, even if they are not directly involved with the case.

For years, human rights organizations and free speech campaigners have said the lese majeste law has been used as a political tool to silence critics of the Thai government.

Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political scientist from Chulalongkorn University, said Wednesday’s verdict “raises questions about the monarchy’s role in Thailand’s constitutional order.”

“The court decision to uphold the lese majeste law as sacrosanct beyond accountability may suggest that Thailand functions within a monarchical order rather than under a constitution with popular legitimacy.”

Thitinan added that the prosecution of Move Forward “will likely heighten tensions and put the royalist establishment on a collision course with growing demands for reform and progress.”

Protests ignited over similar ruling by same court

Once a taboo subject, the issue of royal reform and amendments to lese majeste has seen a turning point in Thailand since huge youth-led protests in 2020, with people increasingly speaking about the monarchy openly and publicly, despite the legal risks.

Hundreds of thousands of predominantly young people took to the streets in towns and cities across the country, demanding democratic, military and constitutional reforms, as well as reforms to the powerful monarchy.

For the first time, the idea of a sacrosanct monarchy and a king shielded from public scrutiny was openly challenged by a new generation of young Thais.

King Maha Vajiralongkorn ascended to the throne in 2016 after the death of his father, King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who had reigned for seven decades.

Protesters demanding royal reform wanted to abolish the lese majeste law, and to ensure the king is answerable to the constitution, with protesters scrutinizing Vajiralongkorn’s immense wealth and power.

The catalyst for those protests was a similar ruling made by the same court four years ago.

Move Forward’s predecessor, the Future Forward Party, came out of nowhere to win the third most seats in the 2019 election.

But shortly afterward, several of the party’s leaders were banned from politics and the party was later dissolved after the Constitutional Court ruled it had violated electoral finance rules.

Many of those who took part in the protests now face lese majeste charges and long jail sentences and rights groups say the right to freedom of expression in Thailand has come under increased attack since 2020.

Legal Rights group Thai Lawyers for Human Rights said that since the start of those protests in July 2020, at least 1,938 people have been prosecuted for their participation in political assemblies, with at least 262 people charged with lese majeste during that time.

Little hope of change for ‘lost generation’

Move Forward won the most seats and the largest share of the popular vote in the May, 2023 election.

The result was a decisive victory for progressive parties and delivered a crushing blow to the conservative, military-backed establishment that has ruled on and off for decades, often by turfing out popularly elected governments in coups.

But Move Forward was prevented from forming a government because it failed to win enough support for its royal reform agenda in parliament, which heavily favors the establishment under a political system implemented by the previous ruling military junta.

Pita then resigned as leader of the party, which is now in opposition.

Thailand’s turbulent political history has previously seen parties that have pushed for change run afoul of the powerful establishment – a nexus of the military, monarchy and influential elites.

Lawmakers have faced bans, parties have been dissolved, and governments have been overthrown. Thailand has witnessed a dozen successful coups since 1932, including two in the past two decades.

The purportedly independent election commission, anti-corruption commission and the Constitutional Court are all dominated by members in favor of the establishment.

Wednesday’s ruling will likely only further entrench that feeling for many young supporters that there is little hope for change within Thailand’s political system.