Ukrainian soldier Serhii sits on his hospital bed in a public clinic in central Ukraine. There are small pieces of shrapnel embedded in his legs that the doctors can’t retrieve. Despite the pain, he says he is feeling good.

“I can’t believe that now I’m in the hospital, not in the trench. I did not think I would survive,” says the 36-year-old.

Serhii is an infantryman in the 80th Air Assault Galician Brigade. He joined the army soon after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, leaving Finland where he had been living and working as a handyman for the previous 10 years to enlist. In a nod to his past, he was given the call sign “Fin.”

A month ago, on October 27, he and his unit were assigned a mission – to hold the trenches on the eastern front line on the outskirts of Bakhmut. That mission was supposed to last three days but stretched into two weeks after the unit became pinned down by enemy fire. For some of the men it would be the last mission they ever saw.

The unit had been under constant shelling for several days when a mortar exploded near to the dugout containing Serhii and two other men, cutting the group off just as they were about to move position.

“We were all wounded. I was wounded in both legs and immediately touched them to check whether they were still there,” Serhii recalled.

The other two soldiers had broken legs and jaws. One of them was so shocked that he asked to kill himself, so the others took his weapon away. When the evacuation team arrived, Serhii insisted they take the other men first and that he would wait for the next opportunity.

But that opportunity never came. Whenever other units arrived, constant Russian bombardment kept them pinned down and unable to reach Serhii.

Multiple evacuation teams would try to reach Serhii over the next two weeks, but none could get through and some died trying.

“We were under constant enemy fire. The enemy seemed to be looking for our weaknesses or testing our endurance,” he recalled.

With Serhii confined to his trench, his commander used a drone to drop off essentials to him such as water, painkillers, chocolate bars, and even cigarettes.

“The water was a big problem because, first, the drone could not pick up big bottles of water. So the drone dropped small bottles wrapped in paper and tape, but not every bottle could survive (the fall) and they often broke. Water was leaking out. I appreciated every sip of water,” Serhii said.

At the same time, Russian drones were targeting the dugout with more sinister payloads, one of them dropping a grenade right next to Serhii, who by this point had been joined by another Ukrainian soldier who had become cut off.

“It exploded near the other soldier’s back and half a meter from me, near my feet. We were wounded but lucky to survive. It was possible to evacuate only one critically injured soldier. So at that moment I realized I was alone.”

Surrounded

For the next three days Serhii hid in his dugout surrounded by the enemy. Each hour Russian troops came closer and closer to his position. He could hear their voices and knew their plan.

Believing that he would not survive, Serhii contacted his commander on the radio and whispered to him the coordinates of the enemy – essentially calling in artillery strikes on his very own position.

Thanks to Serhii, Ukrainian artillery conducted several accurate strikes, but more Russian soldiers continued to take up positions around him.

“I was surrounded by enemies,” Serhii explained. “When they couldn’t hear me, I whispered the coordinates again on the radio and our artillery fired at them.”

At one point, Serhii thought his time was up when a Russian soldier climbed into his dugout. The soldier asked Serhii where he was from and the Ukrainian replied in Russian that he had a concussion and asked for water. The Russian soldier did not give him water but crawled out of the trench, apparently still unaware Serhii was Ukrainian.

“I still can’t understand how he didn’t realize I was from the Ukrainian armed forces. I was wearing a Ukrainian uniform. My pants were in pixels. Yes, they were dirty. But it was obvious that the boots were Ukrainian,” Serhii recalled.

With all efforts to evacuate Serhii exhausted, his commander eventually told him the only way out was to crawl and pray.

“I had to crawl through the dugout where Russians were. Holding the radio in my left hand on my knees, I started crawling. I came across a tripwire with a grenade on it. I could hear the commander on the radio correcting me, but I could not contact him myself. The battery was almost dead. The commander shouted at me that I should move. So, finally I got to the Ukrainian positions, ‘Fin, keep moving,’ they kept telling me.”

Serhii has now been recovering for more than two weeks. Sitting in the warm hospital ward, he remembers how he licked rainwater from his trench and would dream about every sip.

“You should see what our guys are doing on the front line. How they fight, evacuate, and rescue their dudes. Our guys are paying a very high price. They pay with their blood. All I want is to do is go fishing with my dudes, drink some beers and sit in silence”.

Taras Ratushnyy remembers receiving a phone call from his son Roman during Ukraine’s deadly 2013 Maidan Revolution.

“I’m okay, we are coming back home with my friends from (Kyiv’s Maidan Square). Don’t worry and good night,” Roman said over the phone – even while Taras heard that same voice blaring from his television as his 16-year-old son declared the protesters’ plans to storm a building. 

The protests, which spread across Ukraine and came to symbolize its existential tug-of-war between Europe and Russia, set into motion a young generation determined to shape the nation’s future – and at the fore was Roman.

In some ways, his political convictions began long before Maidan. Both his parents were previously activists and journalists; his mother Svitlana Povalyaeva, also a writer and poet, took part in the Maidan Revolution alongside her two sons.

But that path became clear as Roman came of age against the backdrop of Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, and violence between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russian separatists in the eastern regions.

By 2022, he had become a well-known environmental and anti-corruption activist, with a following of supporters and admirers.

Then, Russia invaded Ukraine.

Roman immediately enlisted with the military, as did his brother and father. Nine years after the Maidan Revolution lit a spark, he was again fighting on the front lines for the future of his country, and for the democratic hopes shared by many of his generation.

But he knew he might not survive this fight. By May that year, Ukraine was losing up to 100 soldiers a day, according to President Volodymyr Zelensky.

That month, Roman – who “had a plan for everything he did,” Taras said – wrote his last will and testament on a single sheet of A4 paper, using both sides.

He laid out requests for his funeral – the ceremony, the music, the Cossack cross monument. He quoted one of his mother’s poems. And he dedicated his love to the city where he was born, as were his parents, and grandparents: “Kyiv, I died far from you, but I died for you.”

Two weeks later, on June 8, 2022, Roman was killed in action near Izium, in eastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv Oblast. He was 24 years old.

Fighting for a European future

The Maidan protests were sparked by Ukraine’s then-President Viktor Yanukovych abruptly scrapping a trade deal with the European Union. Supporters of the deal had hoped it would bring Ukraine closer to the West, generate economic growth, and open borders to trade.

Instead, Yanukovych – a pro-Russia leader – turned toward Moscow, striking new deals with Vladimir Putin, and dashing the opposition’s hopes of stronger ties with Europe.

Furious, thousands of demonstrators occupied Kyiv’s Maidan, or Independence Square. Over the months, the protests swelled to represent broader outrage over Yanukovych’s policies, widespread government corruption, and police brutality — as well as the movement’s pro-democracy, Europe-leaning dreams.

In the midst of all this was Roman. At the time, the best way to find the 16-year-old was to “go to the hottest point (of the clashes),” said Taras. “Ninety-nine percent (of the time) he was there, and one percent he was sleeping somewhere because he was out of batteries.”

In her book about the revolution, history professor Marci Shore recalled asking Roman whether his mother was upset about his participation in the protests. The teenager replied: “My mother was making Molotov cocktails on Hrushevskogo Street.”

The ensuing crackdown came to a head on February 20, 2014, when police and government forces opened fire on protesters. About 100 people are believed to have died during the revolution, which ultimately saw Yanukovych ousted and exiled from Ukraine.

The movement triggered a chain of events that would roil Ukraine for years, including the annexation of Crimea and the simmering conflict in the east near Russia’s border. But it also brought a spate of government reforms – and hope to a generation of young Ukrainians hungry for change.

“Just like (how) you can’t see the forest for the trees, we, as participants of the Maidan, may not be able to see now what impact this event had on the whole history of Ukraine, but I hope it had a serious impact,” said Roman said in a YouTube video uploaded in 2014, near the anniversary of the protests.

“For me, all that was not in vain,” he added. “I see a huge number of positive changes in this country. And they happened only thanks to Maidan.”

‘My youth, my life, and my fight’

When the war broke out in 2022, Roman – who had become known for fighting to protect a green space in Kyiv from real estate development – joined the Battle of Kyiv to push Russian forces from the capital.

He then joined the 93rd separate mechanized brigade, helping to liberate a town from Russian occupation and fighting in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy Oblast.

Through it all, he posted occasional Instagram photos of himself and fellow soldiers – at one point posting a poem by the executed Ukrainian intellectual Mykhail Semenko.

“When I die, I will die not of death / but of life,” reads one translation of the poem by Ukrainian-American writer Boris Dralyuk. “When all nature grows calm, I’ll depart, / ahead of the last stormy night – / in a flash, when death seizes my heart, / my youth, my life, and my fight.”

His father, meanwhile, tried not to think about the danger Roman was in.

“All I can do is ask, how are you? How can I help you? But (those were) kind of stupid questions from a father who is very far and cannot make any impact on his condition,” Taras said during his visit to the cemetery in November.

After Roman was killed in June 2022, his body was brought back to Kyiv, with the funeral and memorial service attended by hundreds of mourners including the city mayor. Large crowds gathered in Independence Square to pay tribute – the very place he had fought as a young protester in 2013, when his future stretched long and bright before him.

Now, more than a year later, the memory of Roman’s legacy – and that of the Maidan Revolution – continues to resonate with Ukrainians as the war grinds on into its second winter, and as Ukraine pushes hard to join the European Union.

This longtime ambition took a step forward in November, when the bloc’s executive body said detailed negotiations for membership should begin next year.

“I wish him to be proud of us. I see that it’s one year and more (since his death), but almost every day something is going on connected with Roman,” Taras said, visibly emotional. “Thousands of Ukrainians are stepping into the battle in his name trying to continue what he did. I see that Roman is still in action.”

Scientists have used the remains of some 500 people to create a series of “bone biographies” that provide a glimpse inside the ordinary lives of plague survivors of the English city of Cambridge.

The skeletons, which came from a series of archaeological digs that began in the 1970s, date back to between 1000 and 1500.

During that medieval era, Cambridge was home to a few thousand people. The bubonic plague — known as the Black Death — came to the city between 1348 and 1349, killing 40% to 60% of its population, according to the study.

Archaeologists used radiocarbon dating and DNA analysis to study the bones of townsfolk, scholars, friars and merchants, eventually focusing on 16 people by examining their DNA, bodily trauma, activities and diets to paint a fuller picture of their existence, called osteobiographies. The findings appear in a study published Thursday in the journal Antiquity.

“An osteobiography uses all available evidence to reconstruct an ancient person’s life,” said lead study author John Robb, a professor at Cambridge University, in a statement. “Our team used techniques familiar from studies such as Richard III’s skeleton, but this time to reveal details of unknown lives — people we would never learn about in any other way.”

The bone biographies are available on Cambridge University’s After the Plague project website.

“The importance of using osteobiography on ordinary folk rather than elites, who are documented in historical sources, is that they represent the majority of the population but are those that we know least about,” said study coauthor Dr. Sarah Inskip, researcher and osteoarchaeologist at the University of Leicester, in a statement.

Extracting stories from bones

The five-year After the Plague project, which began in 2016, focused on investigating burials from Cambridge’s Hospital of St. John the Evangelist, the medieval parish church of All Saints by the Castle, and the Augustinian Friary. Together, the bones tell a collective story about a cross section of people living in medieval Cambridge and the hardships they faced.

The researchers gave their subjects pseudonyms based on records from the time.

“Death and time ensure anonymity for our sources, but we wanted to them to feel relatable,” Robb said.

The osteobiographies provide windows into the lives of people such as Anne, a woman with repeated injuries that caused her to hobble on a shortened right leg, and Eudes, a friar with a square jaw who enjoyed a rich diet and suffered from gout.

The bones also tell surprising stories, such as that of Edmund, who suffered from leprosy but may not have been diagnosed and wasn’t ostracized. He lived among the general population before being buried in a rare wooden coffin, rather than a simple burial shroud. And then there was Wat, who survived the plague and died as an older man with cancer.

Wat was a resident of the charitable Hospital of St. John, which was founded to house the poor and infirm as a type of medieval benefits system.

“Like all medieval towns, Cambridge was a sea of need,” Robb said. “A few of the luckier poor people got bed and board in the hospital for life. Selection criteria would have been a mix of material want, local politics, and spiritual merit.”

A dozen or so people could stay at the hospital at a time and sometimes lived there for years. The hospital was founded in 1195 and lasted for hundreds of years before St. John’s College replaced it in 1511. It was founded to help the poor, rather than provide medical care, and statutes prevented the limited staff from taking in those who could not care for themselves.

“We know that lepers, pregnant women and the insane were prohibited, while piety was a must,” Robb said. The hospital residents were required to pray for the souls of the hospital benefactors, Robb said. “A hospital was a prayer factory.”

While many of the skeletons belonged to locals who lived in Cambridge or surrounding villages, three people buried at the hospital’s cemetery appeared to have traveled great distances to reach the city. One of them was a woman named Christiana.

An analysis of her bone chemistry suggests she came from as far as Norway. The researchers aren’t sure what brought her to Cambridge as a young adult, but it was likely for a short-term trip involving trade, traveling with merchant family members, or attending the annual Stourbridge Fair, one of the largest fairs in England held on the outskirts of the city.

Sometime during her visit, Christiana died. Her bones don’t reveal injury or severe chronic disease, but a rapid infection may have killed her.

While the hospital didn’t take in short-term residents for medical care, Christiana was laid to rest in the cemetery’s consecrated ground as a form of charity, according to the project.

Life in medieval times

Analyzing each skeleton gave the researchers insights into the diets of Cambridge’s residents, the physical toll of their daily lives, and any illnesses or injuries they endured. The bones revealed how tough life could be.

For example, half of those buried in the All Saints cemetery did not survive childhood. And children buried in the hospital cemetery were small for their age, showing signs of anemia, injury and illness such as tuberculosis.

The hospital residents bore traces of harsh childhoods shaped by famine and widespread diseases. But things often changed once they came to stay at the hospital, showing they were served a balanced and nutritious diet that allowed many to improve in their final years.

Because it can take years for dietary changes to be reflected in bones, the analysis showed that some residents, such as Maria, may have lived there for five to 10 years. Maria experienced illness from the time she was young, and likely died of tuberculosis between the ages of 18 and 25.

Things were different for the men at the Augustinian Friary, who were on average an inch taller than the townspeople and enjoyed a diet filled with meat and fish.

Studying arm bones also revealed a population of early university scholars buried in the hospital cemetery. The townsmen all had strongly developed right arms, reflecting the manual or craft labor of their trade, but 10 male skeletons stood out.

“These men did not habitually do manual labour or craft, and they lived in good health with decent nutrition, normally to an older age. It seems likely they were early scholars of the University of Cambridge,” Robb said. “University clerics did not have the novice-to-grave support of clergy in religious orders. Most scholars were supported by family money, earnings from teaching, or charitable patronage. Less well-off scholars risked poverty once illness or infirmity took hold. As the university grew, more scholars would have ended up in hospital cemeteries.”

Some skeletons belonged to those who did not survive the plague, such as Dickon, who died between 45 and 60 years old. After becoming ill, he likely lived only for two to three days, sheltering at home before succumbing to the Black Death. But those who cared for him made sure he was buried properly in the local church cemetery, according to the project.

While the Black Death was responsible for claiming thousands of lives, it wasn’t the greatest threat, the study authors said. Chronic infectious diseases such as tuberculosis affected populations across Europe.

“Everyday diseases, such as measles, whooping cough and gastrointestinal infections, ultimately took a far greater toll on medieval populations,” Robb said.

Israeli authorities recalled their team of negotiators from Qatar after reaching a “dead end” in talks to release hostages held by Hamas in Gaza, according to a statement released by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office.

The talks in the Gulf nation had led to a tenuous truce between Hamas and Israel that lasted seven days before collapsing on Friday morning.

In the statement, Israel blamed Hamas for failing to “fulfill its part of the agreement, which included the return of all women and children held hostage.”

The negotiators were from Israel’s Mossad intelligence service and the statement said it was the head of the agency, David Barnea, who recalled the team.

As the diplomatic process stood at an impasse, Hamas pushed to begin discussing the release of men – possibly on a different set of terms, according to the source. Israel rejected that idea, insisting that it was imperative that all women be released first.

Hamas in a statement held Israel and the United States responsible for ending the dialogue. The militant group said Israel refused its offers to exchange prisoners and hand over the bodies of hostages it said had died during the bombardment of Gaza.

Saleh Al-Arouri, deputy head of Hamas’ political bureau, confirmed to Al Jazeera TV on Saturday that negotiations had ended, adding there would be no more hostages released until there is a ceasefire.

The remaining hostages still being held by Hamas are current or former soldiers, Al-Arouri said, adding that adult males will be subject to different standards by Hamas.

“We said from day one that the price for releasing Zionist prisoners is the liberation of all our prisoners, after the ceasefire,” Al-Arouri said.

Qatari and American mediators are still working to find a way to bring back a temporary stop in the fighting, Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters on Saturday after speaking with the Emir of Qatar on the sidelines of the COP28 climate summit in Dubai.

“Our work is ongoing to support some ability to reopen the pause and to have a deal going forward where there will be a pause so that we can get hostages out and get aid in,” Harris said at a news conference.

Harris also said that while the US supports Israel’s “legitimate military objectives” in Gaza, the civilian suffering inside the enclave has been too high.

“As Israel defends itself, it matters how,” she said. “Too many innocent Palestinians have been killed. Frankly, the scale of civilian suffering, and the images and videos coming from Gaza are devastating.”

Israeli offensive resumes

The Israel Defense Forces said it carried out more than 400 strikes in the first 24 hours of renewed fighting that began Friday morning, targeting both Hamas and Islamic Jihad, another militant group in Gaza.

The Hamas-run Ministry of Health in Gaza said Saturday that most of the victims were women and children, and dozens are feared dead after the apparent bombardment of a multi-story concrete building in the Jabalya refugee camp.

Among the victims was Dr. Sufyan Tayeh, a prominent Palestinian scientist and the president of the Islamic University of Gaza, according to a statement by the Palestinian Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research. He was killed alongside his family, the statement said.

Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, said in a statement late Saturday that it had launched a barrage of rockets from northern Gaza toward Tel Aviv.

The group claimed the attack was in response to what it called “Zionist massacres against civilians.”

Despite the resumption of hostilities, the two sides on Friday continued to negotiate in Qatar through mediators to pause the fighting in exchange for the release of more hostages, sources said.

However, negotiators began expressing concern before Friday’s collapse that Hamas may no longer be holding enough women and children to get Israel to continue pauses in fighting.

Israel had agreed to extend the truce daily for every 10 hostages Hamas released. It released three Palestinian prisoners in exchange for every hostage.

The Israel Defense Forces said Friday that there are 136 hostages still being held in Gaza, including 17 women and children. It is unclear how many of those are being held by Hamas as opposed to other militant groups that operate in the territory.

Israeli and US officials believe that Hamas continues to hold hostage a number of women in their twenties and thirties, many of them kidnapped from the Nova music festival. Hamas has insisted that some of the remaining women they were holding hostage were considered a part of the IDF, which Israel denies.

When the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, French women were paying close attention. They watched with alarm as those across the Atlantic lost their long-standing right to abortion, seemingly overnight. What if France came next?

A year and a half later, France is en route to enshrine the right to abortion in its constitution, a move that would make it very difficult for future parliaments to chip away at it with restrictive legislation.

Left-wing lawmakers like Vogel are leading the charge, but the bill has garnered rare cross-party support. It’s backed by the French government itself, with President Emmanuel Macron recently promising that “in 2024, women’s freedom to have an abortion will be irreversible.”

If the bid is successful, the French constitution will become the first in the world to include the right to abortion, according to Stephanie Hennette-Vauchez, a public law professor and constitutional expert..

Although the motion has garnered broad support in France, there has been no shortage of criticism from right-wing lawmakers. Politicians such as Jordan Bardella, president of the far-right National Rally party, have suggested constitutionalization is pointless, as abortion rights in France are not under threat.

“France is not the United States’ 51st federal state,” Bardella said on French TV, “there is no serious widespread political movement in France calling into question the [abortion] law.”

Meanwhile, women’s rights advocates insist that enshrining abortion rights in the constitution, while important, will do nothing to facilitate access, a growing issue in rural parts of France.

If the US isn’t safe, are we?

For many women in France, the overturning of Roe v. Wade last summer hit too close to home. Popular French TV host Enora Malagré, who has spoken openly about her own abortion aged 20, said she was distraught when she heard the news.

Currently, abortion rights in France are protected by a 1975 law which has been amended on numerous occasions, most recently in 2022, to lengthen the time frame for legal abortions from 12 to 14 weeks of pregnancy. Like all laws, however, it could be revoked by a vote in the French parliament.

Changing the constitution, on the other hand, is a much more challenging process, requiring either a national referendum or a 3/5th majority vote in the French Congress — a special body composed of both chambers of parliament. According to backers of the bill, therefore, constitutionalization would safeguard abortion rights even if a pro-life majority were to be voted into office.

Rossignol believes that the overturning of Roe v. Wade had a huge impact on public opinion in France, instilling a fear that abortion rights could be placed under threat at any moment.

The sentiment is echoed by organizations in France on the front line of the fight for reproductive rights, who are fearful of further reversals globally.

“When the far right came into power in certain countries, one of the first things they attacked was… the right to abortion,” said Sarah Durocher, president of Planning Familial, the French branch of Planned Parenthood International. “I don’t see why France would be an exception,” she added.

Last year, Hungary’s hardline nationalist government made it mandatory for women to listen to the fetal heartbeat before an abortion. In Poland, where abortions are only allowed in the event of rape, incest or a threat to the mother’s health, further restrictions were passed in 2020, when abortions on the grounds of fetal defect were outlawed by the conservative Law and Justice party. Just last week, Argentina elected a far-right president who has pledged to reverse the abortion rights the country acquired in 2020.

‘Now or never’

In France, recent polling data suggests 86% of people are now favorable to the constitutionalization of abortion rights.

On November 3, the French government presented a draft text to France’s highest administrative court. Once the text is approved, the Congress will convene in the Palace of Versailles to vote on it. If a majority vote is achieved, the amendment will be added to the constitution.

Macron’s government currently holds enough support in parliament to presume a positive vote.

“We have to do it now,” said Vogel, who submitted the first draft proposal in August 2022. “We have a majority in parliament. We have a majority in society. So it’s now or never,” she concluded.

Many, including Vogel, fear that the growing popularity of right-wing political parties in France might make a similar amendment impossible to pass as early as the next French elections in 2027.

Despite voting in favor of the bill, right-wing political leader Marine Le Pen, who won 41.5% of the French vote in the 2022 presidential election, has traditionally supported rollbacks on abortion rights.

Just last year, the National Rally lawmaker opposed the extension of the legal abortion time frame from 12 to 14 weeks. In those two weeks “the medical act completely changes in nature,” Le Pen told French media outlet Brut, “it is much more traumatizing for women.”

Like other right-wing leaders, Le Pen has also said the proposal to constitutionalize abortion rights is “completely useless.”

Earlier this year, an anti-abortion campaign group called Les Survivants (The Survivors) brought this sentiment into the public domain, plastering stickers with anti-abortion messages onto Paris’s public rental bikes.

In a statement issued in May, the group said this move was a direct response to the efforts to enshrine abortion rights in the French constitution.

Symbolic gesture or real change?

Even among those advocating for the constitutionalization of the amendment, there has been debate over its exact wording.

The current draft submitted by the government accords women the “freedom” to access abortions rather than the “right” to do so, as had been the case in Vogel’s first draft.

The exact phrasing of the article reads: “The law determines the conditions under which a woman’s freedom to resort to a voluntary interruption of pregnancy, which is guaranteed to her, is exercised.”

Hennette-Vauchez, the constitutional expert, is wary that this “watered-down” version of the text might not be as effective at safeguarding abortion rights as the original. While the article guarantees the freedom to have an abortion, it also gives lawmakers leeway to determine the conditions under which this freedom can be exercised, she explained, a power that could be abused in the future.

Additionally, the constitutional amendment per se will do nothing to address France’s growing problem with abortion access, according to Hennette-Vauchez. “You can put it in the constitution,” she said, but that’s “not going to open up a service that actually does abortions … less than 120 km (75 miles) from where you live.”

Recent cuts to public health funding have led to the closure of hundreds of maternity clinics in France, making access to abortions, although legal, difficult for many, said Durocher. Her organization, Planning Familial, has assisted several women needing to travel to different areas of the country to get abortions, she added.

The closure of maternity clinics has also limited the access to surgical abortions, which made up just 22% of abortions in France in 2022. According to Durocher, this predominance of medication abortions is evidence of a lack of choice when it comes to reproductive rights and care.

At the moment, there are only three constitutions in the world that mention abortion, all  with the purpose of outlawing it, Hannette-Vauchez explained. “If we are the first country to gesture towards a freedom to have an abortion in the constitution,” she said, “it opens up a conversation about why we have been living in a world where reproductive issues are silenced by constitutions globally.”

Vogel is determined to continue to speak up.

“Anti-choice movements and reactionary forces are organized and they are strong, but we are stronger and we should never give up on fighting for abortion rights,” said Vogel. “It’s at the core of having an egalitarian society.”

North Korea has warned any potential interference or attack on its “space assets” by the United States will be “deemed a declaration of war,” the state media outlet KCNA reported on Saturday.

“The US Space Force’s deplorable hostility toward the DPRK’s reconnaissance satellite can never be overlooked as it is just a challenge to the sovereignty of the DPRK, and more exactly, a declaration of war against it,” the country’s defense ministry said in a statement reported by KCNA.

DPRK stands for Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the official name of North Korea.

The warning came less than two weeks after Pyongyang said it had put its first spy satellite into space, in a move which analysts predicted could enable the country to more accurately target opponents’ forces, if the spacecraft works.

Neither South Korea, the United States nor Japan, all of which are experiencing increasing military tensions with North Korea, could confirm “Malligyong-1,” had made it into orbit.

Just days after the North Korean launch, the South sent its own first spy satellite into orbit with the help of space company SpaceX.

The KCNA report claimed that Pyongyang’s warning followed an alleged comment from a US Space Command official who “spouted rubbish hinting at a military attack on the DPRK’s reconnaissance satellite.”

KCNA said that the unnamed American official allegedly claimed the US “can decrease the enemy country’s outer space operation capabilities” by employing “diverse reversible and irreversible methods.”

It’s unclear who that US official may be.

Pyongyang says its satellite is for reconnaissance and “is not regarded as a space weapon by international law for its technical features aimed at observation.”

However, analysts claim the spacecraft is meant for spying and increasing North Korea’s military capabilities.

In response to the November 21 launch, the US Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Thursday sanctioned eight foreign-based DPRK agents “that facilitate sanctions evasion, including revenue generation and missile-related technology procurement that support the DPRK’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs.”

It also sanctioned what it called a cyber espionage group called Kimsuky for “gathering intelligence to support the DPRK’s strategic objectives,” according to a statement on the Treasury Department’s website.

The November launch was condemned by North Korea’s neighbors Japan and South Korea, with Seoul calling it a “clear violation” of a UN Security Council resolution that prohibits North Korea from using ballistic missile technology.

However, Pyongyang warned that if its reconnaissance satellite is regarded as a “military threat” that “must be gotten rid of” then it should also destroy “countless spy satellites of the US flying above the Korean peninsula region every day, exclusively tasked with monitoring the major strategic spots of the DPRK.”

It also called the US “chief culprit of evils” for allegedly turning space “into a theater of war.”

Pyongyang’s move has led the South Korean government to partially suspend an agreement it had with North Korea that limited the South’s reconnaissance and surveillance activities along the demilitarized zone (DMZ) that separates the two countries.

North Korea subsequently vowed to deploy new military hardware along the military demarcation line.

The Biden administration has finalized a rule to significantly cut the US fossil fuel industry’s emissions of methane, a powerful planet-warming gas that scientists and climate advocacy groups have pressed nations to rapidly reduce as global temperature soars.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan and White House National Climate Adviser Ali Zaidi will unveil the rule at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai on Saturday – a day where cutting methane emissions will be a major theme and several multi-lateral announcements are expected to be made.

Methane, the main component of natural gas and a byproduct of fossil fuel drilling, is a potent source of climate pollution with more than 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide during its first two decades in the atmosphere. The oil and gas industry is one of the main sources of global methane emissions, according to the International Energy Agency.

The new US rule, which will be implemented by the EPA, is expected to slash methane emissions by nearly 80% through 2038, compared to what they would have been without the rule. The EPA estimates it will stop about 58 million tons of methane from escaping into the atmosphere during that period – the equivalent of taking more than 300 million gas-powered cars off the road for a year.

The rule will crack down on methane leaks from industry in several ways. In a major new development, it will end routine flaring of the natural gas that is a byproduct of drilling oil wells and will phase in a requirement for that gas to be captured instead of burned. The rule will also require stringent leak monitoring of oil and gas wells and compressors, and cut down on leaks from equipment like pumps, storage tanks and controllers.

It will also rely on independent, third-party monitoring – using satellites and other remote-sensing technology – to find very large methane leaks.

Regan said the US rule signified “strong action” from the Biden administration by “significantly slashing methane emissions.” The US is the world’s largest oil producer, drilling and selling 21% of the world’s oil last year.

“From mobilizing billions in investment to plug orphaned wells, patch leaky pipes, and reclaim abandoned mines to setting strong standards that will cut pollution from the oil and gas sector, the Biden-Harris Administration is putting the full weight of the federal government into slashing harmful methane pollution,” Zaidi added in a statement.

Methane emissions surged in recent years, to the surprise of scientists and energy experts, who are now advocating for capping leaks and ending flaring and venting as easy ways to pump the brakes on the pace of global warming.

The EPA’s plan to end routine flaring is a major step forward, said Jon Goldstein, senior director for regulatory and legislative affairs at the Environmental Defense Fund, who focuses on methane pollution.

“The latest science is showing that flares are not just sources of waste, they’re also large sources of pollution because they’re just not working right,” Goldstein said. “The easiest way to stop that pollution is to stop sending it to flares in the first place. It doesn’t seem logical, why are you burning off this product you can sell?”

Correction: The oil and gas industry is one of the main sources of global methane emissions. This story has been updated.

The eastern Ukrainian town of Avdiivka is increasingly becoming a flashpoint in the conflict, where fighting remains intense even when the front lines have barely moved for months.

Russia appears to have made tactical advances in the outskirts of the embattled town as Ukraine claims it is inflicting heavy losses on assaulting troops.

With the weather getting colder and both sides struggling for a breakthrough, Ukraine’s president also announced he would shore up his country’s defenses.

Here is what you need to know about the past week in Ukraine.

Zelensky bolsters front line defenses

Ukraine is stepping up efforts to bolster defenses and fortifications across the country.

President Volodymyr Zelensky announced a countrywide initiative to strengthening defensive positions on Thursday, outlining the main areas of focus.

The primary effort will be where heavy fighting is taking place on front lines in the Avdiivka-Mariinka direction in eastern Donetsk, and the defensive line near Kupiansk in the north-eastern Kharkiv region.

Defensive fortifications will be bolstered along all of Ukraine’s northern territory which borders Belarus and Russia.

Positions will also be strenegthened in the southern Kherson region where Ukrainian troops are continuing their attempts to widen a bridgehead in the Russian occupied bank of the Dnipro River.

Analysts warn that building up fortifications with active shelling in some areas and harsh winter conditions can pose a challenge.

Zelensky’s announcement comes as the war enters what Ukraine’s top military chief called “positional war”— a maturing phase of the conflict where neither side has the ability to generate force overmatch or significant breakthrough leading to more static and solidified frontlines.

Analysts have pointed to Russian defensive positions which managed to keep Ukraine’s summer counteroffensive from gaining ground as an example of the effectiveness of fortified lines.

As both side dig in, it makes seizing significant territory without huge attrition – where depth of manpower and equipment becomes a determining factor – harder and harder.

‘It gets worse and worse’: The fight for Avdiivka

Russian forces continued their attempts to fully encircle the town of Avdiivka in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region where harsh winter conditions have reportedly complicated maneuvers for both Ukrainian and Russian forces.

Pro-Russian bloggers have reported tactical advances in the industrial zone in the southeast and the rail lines in the northwest of the town throughout the week as the Ukrainian military claimed they are holding defensive positions.

Russia maintains air superiority and has been making use of guided aerial bombs, retrofitted Soviet-era munitions with high explosive loads that are released by Russian warplanes outside the range of air defenses, as high velocity winds and snow limit the use of drones.

A local official said Russia has been focusing on trying to get the high ground in the industrial zone in Avdiivka but has not been successful. Ukraine claims defensive actions in and around the town are inflicting heavy losses on Russian troops and equipment.

Ukrainian police have been helping locals evacuate. Some 1,300 civilians remain in Avdiivka, which has been a front line town since 2014.

An elderly couple who were evacuated from Avdiivka this week recounted the decision to leave. “It gets worse and worse day after day… we get almost no sleep. Shelling and shelling and shelling…We thought we could wait, that things would get better, but we have run out of patience,” she said. “At least now, we can get some sleep.”

Some essential workers are in the city to provide services for the remaining civilians, including two doctors and four nurses, according to the head of local military administration Vitalii Barabash. If needed “most of them have already packed their bags and are ready to leave within an hour.”

Ukraine claims it sabotaged two Russian trains in Siberia

Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) is responsible for explosions on two trains traveling along a strategic rail route in eastern Russia this week, a Ukrainian defense source claimed Friday.

If confirmed, the strikes show Kyiv’s intent and ability to disrupt Russian logistics thousands of miles away from the frontlines of Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

With train traffic rerouted around the tunnel, the SBU on Thursday targeted the second train as it passed over the nearby Devil’s Bridge, according to the source.

Both explosions were the result of planted “explosive devices,” the source claimed.

“The Russians have fallen into the SBU’s trap twice,” the source said. The twin bombings were a “special operation to disable this important railroad,” the source added.

Russian Telegram channels reported news of two train fires in the area. Videos circulated by some Russian telegram channels show wagons on fire along a rail track, although it is not immediately clear which incident the videos are from.

Russia has not immediately called Wednesday’s explosion an attack or blamed Ukraine for what it has so far characterized as “a cargo train fire.” Unofficial Russian media reported investigators are looking into the possibility of “sabotage.”

The Ukrainian source said the Russians use the railroad for “military logistics” and characterized the route as “the only major railroad connection between Russia and China.” The targeted trains were carrying fuel, the source said.

Ukrainian analysts said the route is critical for Russian deliveries from North Korea and China.

Finland closes border with Russia after migrant surge

The warning light turned from green to red at the last operating checkpoint on the Finnish side of the border with Russia this week as Moscow’s international isolation continues to grow.

Finnish television announced the closure: “The entire eastern border of Finland is now closed.

The crossing was one of the few entry points for Russians after many Western countries shut their air space and borders to Russian planes in response to the Ukraine invasion.

The 1,340-kilometer- (833-mile-) long border will be closed for at least two weeks.

Finland’s decision came as more and more third country nationals started arriving from Russia. Helsinki accused Russia of weaponizing refugees and asylum seekers and called the arrivals a “Russian hybrid operation.”

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg accused Russia of using migration as a “tool” to create “pressure” along its border with Finland. “We have seen them using energy, we have seen them using cyber attacks, we have seen them using different kinds of clandestine operations to try and undermine our democracies. The fact that Russia is using migration as a tool is now another example of the attempt to put pressure on neighbors,” Stoltenberg said at a news conference in Brussels.

Russia called Finland’s decision to close all border checkpoints “irrational.”

Ukrainian spy chief’s wife hospitalized after apparent poisoning

Marianna Budanova, who is married to Ukraine’s defense intelligence (GUR) chief Kyrylo Budanov, was hospitalized with apparent heavy metals poisoning the GUR said, raising concerns that Russia may have the capacity to target senior Ukrainian leadership.

The seriousness of Budanova’s condition was not immediately apparent.

Russia — and the Soviet Union before that — has been known to carry out extra-territorial poisonings against its enemies.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog spent his day on Friday meeting with high-profile leaders at the COP28 climate talks in Dubai. The same day, his country’s army dropped leaflets around southern Gaza, warning residents to flee — its combat operations against Hamas were resuming after a seven-day pause.

Herzog was supposed to give an address that day calling for action on the climate crisis. His slot came and went; he didn’t speak. He was instead meeting with the likes of King Charles III and leaders of the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, the European Union, the United Kingdom and India, as well as the United Nations Secretary General.

The discussions were private, but no doubt the top of Herzog’s agenda was soliciting support, or at least tolerance, for Israel’s part in the war with Hamas, and helping secure the release of the remaining 136 hostages who were abducted from Israel by the armed group in its October 7 attack. Since then, Israel has retaliated with enormous military might, in a war that has killed more children than all the conflicts around the world in a year put together.

The Israel-Hamas war is casting a shadow over the COP28 climate talks. Friday only marked Day 2 of proceedings, yet the subject has been unavoidable in press conferences, speeches and even in the optics of photos and handshakes.

Some participants walked around the summit venue wearing lanyards in the colors of the Palestinian flag. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa openly accused Israel of committing war crimes in formal speeches that were supposed to be about climate to thousands of delegates, in remarks publicized well beyond Dubai.

Meanwhile, Israel’s allies, like UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, repeated the line that Israel “has the right to defend itself.” Sunak met with at least four leaders about the war —  it’s unlikely he had much time left for climate.

It’s not surprising or even untoward that Herzog would spend his time at COP28 with influential leaders — there are few opportunities as awash with powerful players as the first two days of the UN-backed talks. But it is symbolic of an ongoing problem — the world struggles to make room for the drudging issue of climate change when conflicts happening in the now use up so much time, money and attention.

Already, the heat of the war has entered the talks. The Iranian delegations left the summit because Herzog and the Israeli delegation were present, according to Iranian state media IRNA. Iran doesn’t recognize Israel. It’s not clear if its delegation plans to return.

As 2023 is on track to be the hottest year on record, there is a growing sense of urgency that countries need to put aside their differences for the climate crisis — the consequences of feuding while the planet fries in record heat and crumbles from deadly extreme weather events are just too grim to ignore. The US and China, for example, agreed to resume a climate working group last month and pledged a major ramp-up of renewable energy after a freeze since August last year.

But in reality, the scourges of conflict and climate change have become so intertwined — even horrifically similar in their outcomes — that addressing them together may be an inevitability.

That point was made clearly by Jordanian King Abdullah II, who in his speech Friday warned that war would only worsen the Middle East’s acute water stress and food insecurity, already fuelled by the climate crisis.

“My friends, this year’s conference of the parties must recognize even more than ever that we cannot talk about climate change in isolation from the humanitarian tragedies unfolding around us,” he said.

“As we speak, the Palestinian people are facing an immediate threat to their lives and well-being. In Gaza, over 1.7 million Palestinians have been displaced from their homes, tens of thousands have been injured or killed in a region already on the frontlines of climate change. The massive destruction of war makes these environmental threats of water scarcity and food insecurity even more severe.”

North-South ‘trust deficit’

The wider, longer-running Israel-Palestinian conflict has caused divisions globally along the lines of race, religion and ethnicity since the state of Israel was established in 1948. But at COP, the current war is also causing a Global North-South divide, according to Ulrich Eberle, Director of Climate, Environment and Conflict at the International Crisis Group, a Brussel’s-based think tank.

In the early days of the war, US President Joe Biden was one of the most emphatic supporters of Israel and its right to defend itself. But his administration has been cornered into softening that tone, as gruesome images of the toll on civilians in Gaza draw outrage against Israel from many corners of the world.

The Middle East has long been wracked with conflict, but the climate crisis was one area that was helping repair old rifts. The UAE — a long-standing supporter of a Palestinian state — had recently begun cooperating with Israel on climate.

In 2021, Israel and the UAE signed a water for energy deal with Jordan that would involve an exchange of solar power for desalinated water. Last month, Jordan pulled out of the deal, with its foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, telling Al Jazeera it couldn’t possibly ratify it “while Israel continues to kill children in Gaza.”

The question now is whether the heat of the war will leave the summit along with the world leaders — who typically fly home after making big, bold statements at the start of talks — or if two weeks of painstaking negotiations around the viability of our planet may just add to tensions among the war’s key players, and their allies and foes.

It’s early days, but so far, the actual negotiations haven’t been too clouded by the conflict, according to Alden Meyer, a senior associate with the climate consultancy E3G.

“It’s not like this is a new dynamic, but it’s obviously a very intense issue right now.”

Conservationists have discovered two kiwi chicks in Wellington, the first wild births recorded for the bird in the New Zealand capital in over 150 years.

The two new chicks come just a year after the Capital Kiwi Project reintroduced the country’s iconic national bird to the city of around 400,000 people.

Their birth in Makara, a suburb just 25 minutes from Wellington’s city center, takes the local total to 65 North Island brown kiwi.

The brown kiwi is one of New Zealand’s most common kiwi species, but according to New Zealand’s Department of Conservation, the birds could be extinct in the wild within two generations without adequate conservation and support.

Another 18 brown kiwi chicks are expected to hatch as part of the Capital Kiwi Project, which hopes to restore a large-scale wild population of kiwi to New Zealand’s capital. The project plans to use transmitters to monitor the two new kiwi chicks as well as any others that hatch.

The flightless birds, which once numbered around 12 million in New Zealand, have seen their population plummet to just 68,000, according to the Save the Kiwi charity. The charity is among approximately 90 Kiwi conservation programs aiming to boost the population.

In 1991, the New Zealand Department of Conservation launched the Kiwi Recovery Plan, which focused on predator control and community engagement.

According to New Zealand’s Department of Conservation, the country’s kiwi population is declining at an average of 2% a year, mostly due to predators like stoats, cats, dogs and ferrets.

95% of wild born kiwi in New Zealand are killed before they reach adulthood, according to Save the Kiwi.

Ward expressed optimism about the project, after the release of the 63 kiwi near Wellington last November which marked the first time in about a century that wild kiwi have lived in the area.