Headline

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky Named Time’s Person-of-the-Year

Published

3 years ago

December 7, 2022

President Of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, has been named Time’s 2022 Person of the Year.

Time Magazine made the announcement on Wednesday, hailing the wartime president for his unwavering strength and “contagious” courage in the face of “unprovoked Russian aggression.”

Zelensky, who has led his country in the ongoing war with Russia, refused to leave the country at the onset of the war despite offers from other country leaders.

Instead, Zelensky has been constantly seeking support from world leaders during the war, which has lasted for over ten months.

“TIME’s 2022 Person of the Year: Volodymyr Zelensky and the spirit of Ukraine,” the magazine cover read.

Time’s reporter, Simon Shuster, wrote: “Zelensky’s success as a wartime leader has relied on the fact that courage is contagious.

“It spread through Ukraine’s political leadership in the first days of the invasion, as everyone realised the president had stuck around.

“His professional instincts derived from a lifetime as an actor on the stage meant he knew how to read a crowd and react to its moods and expectations. Now his audience was the world. He was determined not to let them down.

“Courage came to define his fellow Ukrainians, too. Instead of running for their lives, many Ukrainians grabbed whatever weapons they could find and ran to defend their towns and cities against an invading force armed with tanks and attack helicopters.”

Zelensky, who had surprisingly emerged as Ukraine’s president in 2019, was formerly a comedian and TV personality. In Wednesday’s publication, Shuster noted that the once light-hearted man had changed a great deal following the invasion of Russia into his homeland.

“In April, less than two months into the invasion, Zelensky told me he had aged and changed ‘from all this wisdom that I never wanted,’” he wrote.

Speaking on Ukraine’s recent recapture of a major city, Kherson, from Russian occupation, the president said that in making battlefield decisions, he would focus first on human lives.

“We could have pushed into Kherson earlier, with greater force, but we understood how many people would have fallen,” he said in the interview. “That’s why a different tactic was chosen, and thank God it worked. I don’t think it was some genius move on our part. It was reason winning out, wisdom winning out against speed and ambition.”

Russia continues to face international sanctions as a result of its president, Vladimir Putin’s refusal to back down from his plans to annex the neighbouring country’s territories.

Most recently, the European Union Members of Parliament passed a resolution to recognise Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism.

Headline

42 Killed In Israeli Attacks, Says Gaza’s Civil Defense

Published

2 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Gaza’s civil defence agency reported at least 42 people killed in Israeli attacks on Sunday, as the Israeli army prepared for a new assault on the Palestinian territory’s largest city.

Civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal said there had been several air strikes around Gaza City — which the military is gearing up to capture — including one in the Al-Sabra neighbourhood that killed eight people.

Attacks were also reported elsewhere across the territory, he said, with the “total tally currently rising to 42 dead”.

The army did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the figure.

“The situation is extremely dangerous… Each day, each minute, there are bombings, martyrs, death and blood — we can’t take it anymore,” Al-Sabra resident Ibrahim Al-Shurafa told AFP, explaining strikes and shelling were ongoing.

“We don’t know where to go. Death follows us everywhere,” he added.

Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency or the Israeli military.

The October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel’s offensive has killed at least 62,686 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

AFP

Headline

Venezuela Frees Eight Opposition Leaders

Published

2 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Venezuelan authorities released eight opposition leaders from jail early Sunday, including a former congressman and two Italian citizens, and granted house arrest to five others, an opposition politician said.

Most of those released had been charged with corruption in opposition-run mayoral offices.

Also set free was Congressman, Amirico de Grazia, detained amid protests that erupted during President Nicolas Maduro’s reelection in 2024.

“Today, several families are once again embracing their loved ones. We know there are many left, and we have not forgotten them; we continue to fight for everyone,” two-time former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles said on X.

Opposition leaders Victor Jurado, Simon Vargas, Arelis Ojeda Escalante, Mayra Castro, Diana Berrio, Gorka Carnevalli, as well as Italian nationals Margarita Assenzo and de Grazia were released, Capriles said.

Nabil Maalouf, Valentin Gutierrez Pineda, Rafael Ramirez, Pedro Guanipa, and David Barroso were placed under house arrest.

The Italian government confirmed the release of de Grazia and Assenzo, who must appear in court to clarify the conditions of their release. It also vowed to continue working on securing the release of other detained Italians.

“We have always said, and we maintain it: we will talk to whomever we need to talk to so that there is not a single political prisoner in our Venezuela!” Capriles added.

AFP

Headline

Russia, Ukraine Exchange Prisoners Of War, Civilians

Published

2 hours ago

August 24, 2025

Editor

Russia and Ukraine each sent back more prisoners of war on Sunday in the latest in a series of exchanges that have seen hundreds of POWs released this year, the two sides said.

Large-scale prisoner exchanges were the only tangible result of three rounds of talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul between May and July.

They remain one of the few areas of cooperation between the two countries since Russia’s offensive began in 2022.

“On August 24, 146 Russian servicemen were returned from the territory controlled” by Kyiv, the Russian defence ministry said on Telegram.

“In exchange, 146 prisoners of war of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were transferred” to Ukraine, it added. Ukraine did not confirm any figures for the release.

Russia also said that “eight citizens of the Russian Federation—residents of the Kursk region, illegally detained” by Kyiv were also returned.

Ukrainian forces launched a surprise incursion into Russia’s Kursk region in August last year, seizing hundreds of square kilometres (miles) of territory in a major setback for the Kremlin.

Russia deployed thousands of troops from its ally North Korea as part of a counterattack but did not fully reclaim the region until April.

Among the Ukrainians released on Sunday was journalist Dmytro Khyliuk, President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Khyliuk was kidnapped in the Kyiv region in March 2022. He is finally home in Ukraine,” Zelensky said on social media.

Also freed was former Kherson mayor Volodymyr Mykolayenko, “who spent more than three years in captivity,” Zelensky’s aide Andriy Yermak wrote on X.

“In 2022, he was on the list for return, but Volodymyr voluntarily refused to be exchanged in favour of a seriously ill prisoner with whom he was sharing a cell in a Russian prison,” Yermak said.

AFP