Current events: 2024-08-27

[Wikipedia Current Events]

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Russian invasion of Ukraine
  • Russian strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure
    • 26 August 2024 Russian strikes on Ukraine
      • Russian missile and drone attacks resume across Ukraine in Kyiv and Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, killing at least six people and injuring five others in Kryvyi Rih and Zaporizhzhia. (The Independent) (Kyiv Independent)
  • Ukrainian conscription crisis
    • President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy announces that Poland will cooperate with Ukraine to return "Ukrainians who violated the law, traitors, collaborators" who illegally crossed the Poland–Ukraine border in order to escape conscription in the Russo-Ukrainian War. (UNN)
  • United States and the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Russia–NATO relations
    • Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warns the United States and other NATO members against giving Ukraine approval to use long-range missiles to target Moscow, saying the move risked triggering World War III, which would "not be confined to Europe". (Reuters)
  • Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announces that Ukraine has successfully tested a domestically-produced ballistic missile for the first time. (Ukrainska Pravda)
• Israel–Hamas war
  • Israel–Hamas war hostage crisis
    • The Israeli military and Shin Bet announce they have rescued Qaid Farhan Al-Qadi, a Bedouin Arab hostage who was kidnapped by Hamas during the 7 October attack on Israel, from an underground tunnel in Gaza. (BBC)
• Libyan crisis
  • United States Africa Command General Michael Langley meets with top Libyan National Army officials, including its leader Khalifa Haftar, in Benghazi, Libya to help mediate an end to the political crisis. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

• 2024 Brazil wildfires
  • Forty-eight Brazilian cities issue red alerts for prolonged heavy and hazardous smog coming from extensive wildfires, with the federal capital Brasília being covered in toxic hazardous smog for two days. (AP)

Health and environment

• 2024 Red Sea oil spill
  • The Pentagon reports that the MT Sounion appears to be leaking its 150,000 ton supply of oil into the Red Sea, and was still on fire since Houthi attacks on 22 August. Efforts to salvage the tanker were repelled by Houthi threats. (Reuters)
• Climate change in Namibia
  • The Namibian environment ministry announces a plan to cull 723 wild animals, including 83 elephants, and to distribute the meat to people struggling to feed themselves because of a severe drought across the country. (Reuters)

International relations

• Canada–Mexico relations, Mexico–United States relations
  • Mexico halts its interactions with the Canadian and American embassies in Mexico City due to claimed interference with its independence and internal affairs after both ambassadors criticized reform plans for Supreme Court justices to be instated by popular vote, partly out of fears that it would hurt United States–Mexico trade relations. (Reuters)
• Egypt–Somalia relations
  • Following a defense pact signed by Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi earlier this month, Egypt deploys two C-130 aircrafts carrying military officers and equipment to Mogadishu, Somalia, as the initial phase of a significant deployment that will see up to 10,000 Egyptian soldiers stationed in Somalia. (Garowa Online)
• France–Russia relations
  • Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov states that bilateral relations between France and Russia have "reached a nadir" following the arrest and captivity extension of Russian-born Telegram CEO Pavel Durov in Paris. (Reuters)

Law and crime

• Indictments against Donald Trump
  • Federal prosecution of Donald Trump (election obstruction case)
    • U.S. Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith files a superseding indictment against former U.S. President Donald Trump for his attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election. (Politico)
• Arrest of Pavel Durov
  • French prosecutors publicly accuse Telegram CEO Pavel Durov of twelve charges while in custody including violations associated with drug trafficking, child exploitation, and money laundering. (Kyiv Independent)
• German police shoot a 26-year-old man dead in Moers, Germany, after he attacked two officers with a knife on the street. (AP)

Politics and elections

• 2024 French legislative election
  • France's New Popular Front (NFP) party shuts down future talks with French President Emmanuel Macron to break political deadlock after Macron refused to implement a leftist-led coalition government despite the NFP receiving the second-most votes, and calls for nationwide protests against Macron's "parody of democracy". (Reuters)

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