Israele controlla Rafah. Complotto segreto tenta di assassinare Zelenskyy 🗞️Rassegna del 08/05/2024

Israele

(The Guardian) Israeli forces say they have control of Gaza side of Rafah crossing

• Israeli military forces have taken control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, Israeli officials have said, in the first stage of what appears to be a wider offensive targeting Hamas in the southernmost parts of Gaza.
• Aid officials in the territory said the flow of aid through the crossing, one of the main supply routes for the effort to avert a famine, had been halted.
• António Guterres, the UN secretary general, called for crossings into Gaza to be reopened immediately, and urged Israel to “stop any escalation”.
• Hamas said in a statement on Tuesday that Israel’s seizure of the Rafah crossing aimed to undermine ceasefire efforts.
• Gli oltre 1 milione di palestinesi rifugiati a Rafah sono stati gettati nella confusione, con l'ordine di evacuazione di Israele che ha innescato un esodo di migliaia di persone.

Ucraina

(POLITICO) Ukraine arrests 2 rogue colonels over secret plot to murder Zelenskyy, Kyiv says

• Ukraine’s security service said Tuesday it had foiled a plot to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelenskyy by undercover Ukrainian security officials who were working for Russia.
• Two unnamed colonels from the Ukrainian State Security Department, the SBU were part of a group of covert agents helping Russia’s security service, the FSB, to plot the assassination, Kyiv said.
• The colonels were arrested and Kyiv said the conspiracy included plans to also murder SBU chief Vasyl Malyuk and Military Intelligence boss Kyrylo Budanov.
• Although Russian officials have said in the United Nations that the Kremlin has no plans to kill Zelenskyy, Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s former president and current deputy head of the Russian Security Council, has called to assassinate the Ukrainian leader several times.

Europa

Serbia-Cina:

(Bloomberg) China’s Xi Arrives in Serbia to Bolster Ties With Europe’s East

• China’s President Xi Jinping arrived in Serbia on the second leg of his European tour as he sought to tighten Beijing’s embrace of the Balkan nation in contrast with a more difficult relationship with most of Europe.
• The Chinese leader landed in Belgrade Tuesday night and was greeted by Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and most of the government ministers. [...] The president will finish up his five-day trip with a stop in Hungary, where Prime Minister Viktor Orban stands nearly alone among EU leaders in drawing closer to China.
• Xi’s visit also coincides with the 25th anniversary of the deadly US bombing of the Chinese embassy during the 1999 NATO operation aimed at pushing Yugoslav troops out of Kosovo. That event, which the White House later called a mistake and blamed on faulty maps, triggered widespread protests in China and cemented a more tense relationship with Washington.
• Meeting with Vucic, Xi’s trip will highlight projects such as the new high-speed railway linking Belgrade to Budapest. Direct Chinese investment in Hungary and Serbia exceeds $15 billion with more coming, ranging from car battery plants in Hungary to copper mining in Serbia.

Italia:

(Il Post) Di cosa è accusato il presidente della Liguria Giovanni Toti

• Martedì mattina il presidente della Liguria Giovanni Toti è stato messo agli arresti domiciliari, per un’inchiesta in cui è indagato per corruzione insieme a Paolo Emilio Signorini, ex presidente dell’autorità portuale che gestisce il porto di Genova, e all’imprenditore portuale Aldo Spinelli, in passato presidente delle squadre di calcio di Genoa e Livorno. [Oltre a Toti, Signorini e Aldo Spinelli ci sono diverse altre persone coinvolte nell’indagine]
• L’inchiesta riguarda diversi casi di corruzione che sarebbero avvenuti in vari ambiti: le campagne elettorali organizzate per sostenere la candidatura di Toti, rieletto nel 2020 alla guida d’una coalizione di centrodestra, e la gestione di pratiche di competenza dell’autorità di sistema portuale e della pubblica amministrazione regionale.
• Secondo la procura, Toti avrebbe ricevuto tangenti in cambio di favori, in particolare la concessione di spazi portuali all’azienda di Spinelli. I magistrati hanno accusato Toti di aver accettato finanziamenti per 74.100 euro attraverso il suo comitato elettorale a fronte di diversi impegni. [...] I soldi sarebbero serviti anche per concedere l’assegnazione di spazi portuali dell’ex Carbonile e di un’area demaniale usata dalla società autostrade. Per ottenere questi favori Spinelli avrebbe pagato anche Paolo Emilio Signorini. [...]

Repubblica Ceca:

(Reuters) Czech court removes surgery requirement for gender transition

• The Czech Constitutional Court has struck down a legal requirement for transgender people to undergo surgery before they are able to officially complete their transition, the court said on Tuesday.
• The move brings the central European country in line with most members of the EU and was welcomed by human rights activists.
• Under current law, Czech transgender people have to undergo sex organ surgery and sterilisation, leaving them unable to reproduce, before officially completing their transition.
• That legal requirement was "at odds with the fundamental right of trans people for the protection of their physical integrity in relation to their human dignity," the court said in a statement on its ruling.

Politica internazionale

Nord America

USA:

(The Guardian) Trump hush-money trial: Stormy Daniels describes being ‘startled’ by sexual encounter

• Donald Trump’s criminal trial entered a new stage Tuesday with testimony from Stormy Daniels, an adult film star at the center of his hush-money scandal, who told jurors that they had a sexual liaison in 2006 that left her nervous and ashamed.
• Prosecutors allege that in 2015, Trump, his then lawyer Michael Cohen and tabloid honcho David Pecker plotted to bury stories that could thwart his Republican presidential bid. Cohen allegedly shuttled a $130,000 hush-money payment to Daniels less than two weeks before the 2016 presidential election, to keep her from going public about a claimed sexual liaison with Trump.
• Cohen transferred money to Daniels’s lawyer via a limited liability company he established specifically for the transaction, called Essential Consulting LLC. He allegedly did so through an LLC so that it would not be tracked back to him and, thus, Trump. Trump is charged with falsifying business records in relation to repaying Cohen. Prosecutors allege that Trump falsely listed these repayments as legal services in business documents.
• Daniels’s testimony came one day after Judge Juan Merchan warned that Trump could face jail if he kept violating a gag order.

(Reuters) TikTok, ByteDance sue to block US law seeking sale or ban of app

• TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance sued in U.S. federal court on Tuesday seeking to block a law signed by President Joe Biden that would force the divestiture of the short video app used by 170 million Americans or ban it.
• The companies filed their lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, arguing that the law violates the U.S. Constitution on a number of grounds including running afoul of First Amendment free speech protections. The law, signed by Biden on April 24, gives ByteDance until Jan. 19 to sell TikTok or face a ban.
• The lawsuit said the divestiture "is simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally. ... There is no question: the Act (law) will force a shutdown of TikTok by January 19, 2025, silencing the 170 million Americans who use the platform to communicate in ways that cannot be replicated elsewhere."
• The lawsuit is the latest move by TikTok to keep ahead of efforts to shut it down in the United States as companies such as Snap and Meta look to capitalize on TikTok's political uncertainty to take away advertising dollars from their rival.

Asia e Pacifico

Afghanistan:

(Reuters) Taliban say order restored after Afghan opium poppy protests

• The Afghan Taliban said on Tuesday they have quelled protests in a northern province [Badakhshan] over security forces' attempts to eradicate opium poppy cultivation which generates income for many impoverished farmers.
• In 2022, the Taliban's supreme spiritual leader ordered a ban on narcotics cultivation in the world's then-top opium producer. Many Afghan landowners and labourers rely on growing opium poppies, especially in the Taliban's historic heartland in the south.
• International research firm Alcis released research based on satellite data last year showing there had been a drastic reduction of opium production in most provinces between 2022 and 2023, often by more than 90%. However it noted that in Badakhshan, the amount of land used for poppy growing had grown.
• Badakhshan shares a border with Tajikistan and China, with which the Taliban are trying to improve economic links. The province's population is predominantly ethnically Tajik, in contrast to the Taliban, most of whose top leaders are ethnically Pashtun, which can exacerbate ethnic tensions despite Taliban promises they will govern the country in the interest of all Afghans.