WASHINGTON, D.C. – US President Joe Biden has praised American forces who he said “helped Israel take down nearly all” the drones and missiles launched by Iran yesterday.
Israel said Iran launched hundreds of drones and missiles in its direction, the first time it has attacked Israel directly from its own territory.
It said the “vast majority” were intercepted, but there were a small number of hits including at an IDF base in southern Israel. At least one person, reported to be a young girl, was injured.
Iran earlier warned that Israel would be “punished” for a strike on its consulate in Syria on 1 April, which killed seven Iranian officers including a top commander. Israel has not confirmed or denied whether it was responsible.
“I’ve just spoken with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reaffirm America’s ironclad commitment to the security of Israel,” Mr Biden said shortly after the pair held a call.
“I told him that Israel demonstrated a remarkable capacity to defend against and defeat even unprecedented attacks,” he added. (BBC)…[+]

TEHERAN – Iranian military chief says overnight attack ‘achieved all its goals’, adding that US bases are under threat if it backs Israeli retaliation.
Iran has warned Israel of a larger attack on its territory should it retaliate against Tehran’s overnight drone and missile attacks, adding that the United States should not back an Israeli military action.
“If the Zionist regime Israel or its supporters demonstrate reckless behaviour, they will receive a decisive and much stronger response,” Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi said in a statement yesterday.
Raisi’s statement follows a similar warning by Iranian military chief, Major-General Mohammad Bagheri, who told state TV that a “much larger” response awaits Israel “if it retaliates against Iran Bagheri said the Iranian attack on Israel has achieved all its goals, and in our view the operation has ended, and we do not intend to continue”.
The commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Hossein Salami, also warned that Tehran would retaliate against any Israeli attacks on its interests, officials or citizens.
Meanwhile, Iran’s permanent mission to the United Nations justified Tehran’s response to Israeli “aggression” as a “legitimate defence” in accordance with the UN charter.(Al Jazeera)…[+]

TEHERAN – Iran’s use of hundreds of drones and missiles to directly target Israel on Saturday night and Sunday morning set a number of major political and military precedents.
Here’s a look at what political, military and economic considerations Tehran might have factored in while deciding on the attack that has amplified fears of a larger regional war and that could also affect the direction of Israel’s war on Gaza.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) dubbed the operation “True Promise” to show that top leaders in Tehran, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, intend to make good on their vows of “punishment” for attacks by Israel and others.
The attack was a direct retaliation for an Israeli strike on the Iranian consulate in Damascus on April 1 that killed seven IRGC members, including two generals in charge of leading operations in Syria and Lebanon, along with six other people.It was mainly aimed at strengthening Iran’s deterrence which critics said had been compromised after increasingly confrontational policies and military strikes by the United States and its allies across the region, especially following the January 2020 assassination of top general Qassem Soleimani in Iraq.
Iranian officials also appeared to have exercised a degree of “strategic patience” after the late December assassination of another top IRGC commander in Syria, Razi Mousavi, in an Israeli air raid amid the fallout of the war on Gaza.Inaction, lower-grade strikes, or being content with military action through the “axis of resistance” of aligned groups across the region would in this vein be viewed as too costly for Iran both locally and abroad.
That is true even as Tehran recognises that Israel and the embattled government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may see benefits in escalating tensions across the region and forcing the US military into taking more action against Iran. On the other hand, the unprecedented Iranian attacks may have briefly shifted the world’s attention from the deaths of tens of thousands of women and children in the Gaza Strip, but they could translate into soft power gains for Iran in the Muslim world in the long run, when compared with other regional powers. (Al Jazeera)…[+]

COLOMBIA – Colombia’s National Liberation Army (ELN) rebels said that they are suspending participation in the coming cycle of peace talks with the government, planned for this month, but will attend an extraordinary meeting.
The announcement is the latest development in recent troubles at the talks, restarted by President Gustavo Petro at the end of 2022 as part of his efforts to end Colombia’s six-decade conflict, which killed at least 450,000 people.
The guerrilla group, founded by radical Catholic priests in 1964, said the suspension was due to “government insistence in carrying out a demobilization operation in Narino against the ELN,” referring to regional talks with one of its factions taking place southwestern province.
The parallel talks are contrary to the fair play and good faith which should characterize negotiations, the rebel group, which objected earlier this year to similar talks with communities in Narino, added.
“It is necessary not to lose time,” the government’s negotiating team said in its own statement, saying it was imperative work at the negotiating table move ahead.
The dire situation that people living in the provinces of Arauca, Choco and Narino are confronting must also be attended to, the government added. The government previously has defended the community talks and said the ELN is unnecessarily prolonging negotiations.
The ELN said its delegates are already in Caracas, Venezuela for an extraordinary meeting it requested with the government earlier this week.(Reuters)…[+]

MEXICO CITY – The Mexican government formally denounced Ecuador’s government to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for the police raid on the Mexican embassy in Quito on April 5, Mexican Foreign Minister Alicia Barcena announced.
“We want to test the international justice system,” Barcena said alongside President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, at a daily press conference.
“We are experiencing a moment of extreme weakness in the multilateral world and in international relations. We see violations all over the world that affect not only diplomats, but the civilian population,” she said.
Mexico’s lawsuit aims to hold Ecuador accountable for breaching “the inviolability” of the embassy and calls for suspending the South American country as a member of the United Nations unless it offers a public apology.
According to Barcena, the ICJ could even rule on the matter to expel the country from the United Nations.
Police stormed Mexico’s embassy in Quito on April 5 to arrest former Ecuadorian Vice President Jorge Glas, just hours after Mexico granted him political asylum, prompting Mexico to sever ties with Ecuador.
“What we want is that a despicable event like the one that Mexico suffered, especially its diplomatic representation, is not repeated,” said Obrador.
“That it is not repeated in any country in the world and that international law is guaranteed, that the premises, the embassies of countries in any nation are not violated and that the countries where the embassies are located be committed to protecting the independence and guaranteeing the sovereignty of those spaces. That is what we want,” he said. (Xinhua)…[+]

SOUTH AFRICA – South Africa’s electoral commission said it has appealed to the country’s highest court to rule on whether former President Jacob Zuma can stand as a candidate in general elections in May.
The commission said in a statement yesterday that it had lodged an “urgent and direct” appeal to the Constitutional Court to provide “certainty” on the proper interpretation of the constitutional article relating to candidacies of people who have been convicted.
“Such clarity is important in the present matter because of a live issue but also for future elections,” it said.
The appeal is the latest twist in a legal wrangle over the eligibility of the 81-year-old politician, after an electoral court ruled this week that Zuma could run for office, overturning an earlier decision that had barred him from contesting.
Zuma is hoping to run for president on behalf of the uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MK), which he joined last year after denouncing the governing African National Congress (ANC) party that he once led.
On May 29, South Africans will head to the polls to elect 400 members of the General Assembly. A month later, lawmakers in the new parliament will choose the next president.
Banking on the popularity of Zuma, MK hopes to win enough votes that would ensure them parliament seats, while also cutting into the vote share of the ANC.
The ANC could see its vote share drop below 50 percent for the first time since 1994. Short of a parliamentary majority, it would be forced to seek coalition partners to remain in power, turning Zuma into a possible kingmaker, analysts say.
Some opinion polls suggested MK at above 10 percent nationwide, a share that would make it the third or fourth political force behind the ANC and the liberal Democratic Alliance.
The party is projected to make a particularly strong showing in the battleground region of KwaZulu-Natal – Zuma’s home province.
It largely relies on the considerable political clout still wielded by Zuma, who despite scandals and corruption allegations is popular, particularly among the country’s more than 10 million Zulus.
The electoral commission had disqualified Zuma, saying the constitution bars anyone sentenced to more than 12 months’ imprisonment.
Zuma was sentenced to 15 months in jail in June 2021 after refusing to testify to a panel investigating financial corruption and cronyism during his presidency.
His lawyers argued the sentence did not disqualify him as it followed civil rather than criminal proceedings and it had been shortened by a remission.
Zuma was freed on medical parole just two months into his jail term.
The commission stressed that the appeal “is not intended to involve itself in the political field of play” rather to ensure a “free and fair” electoral process. (Al Jazeera)…[+]

US – The United States has restricted travel for its embassy personnel in Israel amid fears of an attack by Iran.
The US embassy said staff had been told not to travel outside the greater Jerusalem, Tel Aviv or Beersheba areas “out of an abundance of caution”.
Iran has vowed to retaliate, blaming Israel for a strike on its consulate in Syria 11 days ago, killing 13 people.
Two US officials have told the BBC’s US partner CBS News that an attack could come soon.
One unnamed official said the attack could include more than 100 drones, dozens of cruise missiles and perhaps ballistic missiles as well and will be aimed at military targets in Israel.
Israel has not claimed responsibility for the consulate attack on 1 April but is widely considered to have been behind it.
Iran backs Hamas, the armed Palestinian group fighting Israel in Gaza, as well as various proxy groups throughout the region, including some – such as Hezbollah in Lebanon – that frequently carry out strikes against the Israelis.
Those killed in the consulate attack included a senior commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force in Syria and Lebanon, as well as other military figures.
The attack came at a time of continuing diplomatic efforts to prevent the war in Gaza spreading across the region.
Speaking last Wednesday, US President Joe Biden warned Iran was threatening to launch a “significant attack” and vowed to offer “ironclad” support to Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his government was ready to meet any security challenge, warning that Israel would harm any country that caused it harm.
“We are prepared to meet all of the security needs of the State of Israel, both defensively and offensively,” he said.
The commander responsible for US operations in the Middle East, Erik Kurilla, has travelled to Israel for talks with officials on security threats.
The Pentagon said the visit had been scheduled previously but had been brought forward “due to recent developments”.
Following a call with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, UK Foreign Secretary Lord Cameron urged against further escalation.
Lord Cameron said he had “made clear… that Iran must not draw the Middle East into a wider conflict”.
“I am deeply concerned about the potential for miscalculation leading to further violence,” he said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has spoken to the foreign ministers of China, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to argue that further escalation is not in anyone’s interest.
Following the call, China urged the US to play “a constructive role” in the Middle East, while also condemning the strike widely believed to have been carried out by Israel on Iran’s consulate building in Damascus. It is not clear what form any reprisal attack would take nor whether it would come directly from Iran or via one of its proxies.
On Sunday an Iranian official warned Israel’s embassies were “no longer safe”, suggesting a consulate building could be a possible target.
Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant has told his US counterpart that “any direct Iranian attack” on Israeli territory would “require an appropriate Israeli response against Iran”.
Asked about the travel restrictions, state department spokesperson Matthew Miller said he would not disclose the “specific assessments” behind them, but added: “Clearly we are monitoring the threat environment in the Middle East and specifically in Israel.”
The UK Foreign Office has also updated its travel advice for Israel to state that the country’s government has raised the “possibility of an attack on Israeli territory from Iran, and that such an attack could trigger wider escalation”.
Since the Hamas-led attack on Israel on 7 October, the Foreign Office has warned against travel to large parts of Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
France similarly warned its citizens to “imperatively refrain from travel in the coming days to Iran, Lebanon, Israel and the Palestinian territories”.
Family members of French diplomats in Iran are being evacuated.
German airline Lufthansa has extended a suspension of flights to the Iranian capital Tehran until Saturday.
The October attack saw gunmen kill 1,200 people and take more than 250 hostage after crossing into Israel from Gaza.
Israel says that of 130 hostages still in Gaza, at least 34 are dead. More than 33,000 Gazans, the majority of them civilians, have been killed during Israel’s subsequent offensive in Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry says. (BBC)…[+]

NIGER – Russia has delivered military equipment to Niger that will provide the African country with the “latest generation of anti-aircraft defense systems,” Nigerien state broadcaster RTN said.
The equipment arrived in Niamey last Wednesday along with 100 Russian military instructors who will install the system and train Nigerien soldiers to use it, RTN added.
Russian state media RIA Novosti said early yesterday that Russian military instructors arrived in Niger “to train local forces in the fight against terrorism.”
“This means that Russia is returning to Africa,” an RIA Novosti correspondent reported from the scene, adding that NATO troops have also been arriving in Niamey to further catch a transfer flight to Agadez where “right now about 1,100 American soldiers are located.”
The arrival of Russian instructors followed a recent phone conversation between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Nigerien General Abdourahamane Tiani on March 26 when the two leaders discussed “ensuring security and combating terrorism.”
Since seizing power in a coup last year, Niger’s junta has been strengthening military ties with Russia while turning away from the US and France.
Last month, the junta said it was ending an accord with the US that allowed military personnel and civilian staff from the US Department of Defense to operate in Niger.
France, Niger’s former colonial ruler, withdrew its troops from the African nation at the end of 2023. (CNN)…[+]

SOUTH KOREA – South Korea’s liberal opposition parties scored a landslide victory in a parliamentary election held last Wednesday, dealing a resounding blow to President Yoon Suk Yeol and his conservative party but likely falling just short of a super majority.
The Democratic Party (DP) was projected to take more than 170 of the 300 seats in the new legislature, data by the National Election Commission and network broadcasters showed with more than 99% of the votes counted as of 5:55 a.m. yesterday (5.55 p.m. ET last Wednesday).
A splinter liberal party considered allied with the DP was expected to take at least 10 seats, projections showed.
“When voters chose me, it was your judgment against the Yoon Suk Yeol administration and you are giving the Democratic Party the duty to take responsibility for the livelihood of the people and create a better society,” DP leader Lee Jae-myung said.
Lee won a seat in the city of Incheon to the west of the capital, Seoul, against a conservative heavyweight candidate considered a major ally of the president.
The bitterly fought race was seen by some analysts as a referendum on Yoon, whose popularity has suffered amid a cost-of-living crisis and a spate of political scandals.
“Judgment” was the common theme running through comments by opposition victors, many of whom had campaigned heavily focused on what they said was Yoon’s mismanagement of the economy and his refusal to acknowledge his wife acted improperly when she accepted a Dior bag as gift.
First lady Kim Keon Hee has not been seen in public since Dec. 15 and was absent when Yoon voted, reflecting the view by some analysts and opposition party members that she had become a serious political liability for the president and his People Power Party (PPP).
His PPP was projected to win just over 100 seats, meaning Yoon would avoid the super-majority of a two-third opposition control that could break presidential vetoes and pass constitutional amendments.
But nearing the end of the first two years of his five-year single term allowed by the constitution, Yoon was likely to slip into a lame duck status, some analysts said.
The National Election Commission (NEC) was expected to announce the official results yesterday. Nearly 29.7 million people, or 67% of eligible voters, cast their ballots, according to the NEC.
It marked the highest ever turnout for a parliamentary election, though the numbers were down from the 2022 presidential vote that narrowly brought Yoon to power.
Yoon, who took office in May 2022, was not up for election this time but his ability to pass legislation is likely to be badly damaged by the poor showing by his PPP.
He has suffered low ratings for months, hamstrung in implementing his pledges to cut taxes, ease business regulations and expand family support in the world’s fastest aging society.
Mason Richey, a professor at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, said Yoon might focus more on his overseas agenda now, though those plans could also be at risk if the opposition seeks to cut budgets with its majority.
“Given his likely lame duck status, the temptation for Yoon will be to focus on foreign policy where he will still have statutory power,” Richey said. (CNN)…[+]

VATICAN CITY – A representative of Brazil’s Yanomami people said he met Pope Francis to ask him to support Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s efforts to save his indigenous people.
The Yanomami, estimated to number around 28,000, live in Brazil’s largest Indigenous reservation, in the northern states of Roraima and Amazonas. Invasion of their lands by illegal miners has caused malnutrition and deaths.
“I’ve asked the pope to support the Lula administration, because Lula needs friends. He won’t be able to do it alone. There are a lot of people around him, politicians who don’t want him to solve it,” Davi Kopenawa told reporters.
“The pope said he’s going to talk to him.”
Kopenawa, a shaman who co-founded and chairs the Hutukara Yanomami Association, which campaigns for indigenous rights and the preservation of the Amazon rainforest, met Francis at the Vatican.
He mentioned water poisoning from mercury – used by wildcat miners in the hunt for gold – as one of the biggest threats to his community, along with deforestation for cattle ranching and soya farming.
The Yanomami territory, an area about the size of Portugal, has been invaded by gold miners for decades, but the destructive incursions multiplied in recent years when former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro dismantled environmental protections.
Lula, a leftist three-time president who returned to office in 2023, has led a push to evict illegal miners from Yanomami territory. In January, his administration announced 1.2 billion reais ($239.58 million) in aid for the indigenous community.
Francis, who hails from Brazil’s neighbour Argentina, has made defense of the environment one of the cornerstones of his papacy, and has repeatedly condemned the plundering of natural resources in the Amazon and elsewhere. (Reuters)…[+]

VIETNAM – It was the most spectacular trial ever held in Vietnam, befitting one of the greatest bank frauds the world has ever seen.
Behind the stately yellow portico of the colonial-era courthouse in Ho Chi Minh City, a 67-year-old Vietnamese property developer was sentenced to death yesterday for looting one of the country’s largest banks over a period of 11 years.
It’s a rare verdict – she is one of very few women in Vietnam to be sentenced to death for a white collar crime.
The decision is a reflection of the dizzying scale of the fraud. Truong My Lan was convicted of taking out $44billion (£35billion) in loans from the Saigon Commercial Bank. The verdict requires her to return $27bn, a sum prosecutors said may never be recovered. Some believe the death penalty is the court’s way of trying to encourage her to return some of the missing billions.
The habitually secretive communist authorities were uncharacteristically forthright about this case, going into minute detail for the media. They said 2,700 people were summoned to testify, while 10 state prosecutors and around 200 lawyers were involved.
The evidence was in 104 boxes weighing a total of six tonnes. Eighty-five defendants were tried with Truong My Lan, who denied the charges.
“There has never been a show trial like this, I think, in the communist era,” says David Brown, a retired US state department official with long experience in Vietnam. “There has certainly been nothing on this scale.”
The trial was the most dramatic chapter so far in the “Blazing Furnaces” anti-corruption campaign led by the Communist Party Secretary-General, Nguyen Phu Trong.
A conservative ideologue steeped in Marxist theory, Nguyen Phu Trong believes that popular anger over untamed corruption poses an existential threat to the Communist Party’s monopoly on power. He began the campaign in earnest in 2016 after out-manoeuvring the then pro-business prime minister to retain the top job in the party.
The campaign has seen two presidents and two deputy prime ministers forced to resign, and hundreds of officials disciplined or jailed. Now one of the country’s richest women has joined their ranks.
Truong My Lan comes from a Sino-Vietnamese family in Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon. It has long been the commercial engine of the Vietnamese economy, dating well back to its days as the anti-communist capital of South Vietnam, with a large, ethnic Chinese community.
She started as a market stall vendor, selling cosmetics with her mother, but began buying land and property after the Communist Party ushered in a period of economic reform, known as Doi Moi, in 1986. By the 1990s, she owned a large portfolio of hotels and restaurants.
Although Vietnam is best known outside the country for its fast-growing manufacturing sector, as an alternative supply chain to China, most wealthy Vietnamese made their money developing and speculating in property.
All land is officially state-owned. Getting access to it often relies on personal relationships with state officials. Corruption escalated as the economy grew, and became endemic.
By 2011, Truong My Lan was a well-known business figure in Ho Chi Minh City, and she was allowed to arrange the merger of three smaller, cash-strapped banks into a larger entity: Saigon Commercial Bank.
Vietnamese law prohibits any individual from holding more than 5% of the shares in any bank. But prosecutors say that through hundreds of shell companies and people acting as her proxies, Truong My Lan actually owned more than 90% of Saigon Commercial.
They accused her of using that power to appoint her own people as managers, and then ordering them to approve hundreds of loans to the network of shell companies she controlled.
The amounts taken out are staggering. Her loans made up 93% of all the bank’s lending. (BBC)…[+]