Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is now in its fifth year and shows no signs of ending. The strain on the militaries on both sides of the border has increased both countries’ reliance on recruiting thousands of foreigners, who are primarily sent to high-risk operations on the front lines. Several governments have warned against this practice and urged their citizens not to fall for the lucrative offers, which are often deceptive. A new report published on Wednesday by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and two other organizations analyzes the recruitment of foreigners in Russia and documents Moscow’s campaign to target vulnerable populations through misleading strategies.

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Russian backing for the ruling junta has not stopped rebel fighters striking significant blows in recent days

• Mali in turmoil after insurgents seize towns and kill defence minister

When Assimi Goïta, the leader of Mali’s military junta, sat down with the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, in the Kremlin last summer, it symbolised Moscow’s commanding sway over Mali at the expense of the west.

As the two men spoke, roughly 3,500 miles to the south, about 2,000 Russian troops were propping up the regime in the landlocked desert country, as part of Moscow’s broader push for influence across the Sahel region.

ISLAMABAD, April 27 — Iran’s foreign minister returned to Islamabad on Sunday, ping-ponging from capital to capital as mediators hoped to keep peace talks between Tehran and the United States alive.

Abbas Araghchi visited Oman’s Muscat on Saturday after leaving Pakistan, and is set to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Monday, but there remained no indication that direct US-Iranian talks would resume.

On Saturday, US President Donald Trump scotched a planned trip to Islamabad by his negotiators Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

But in a sign that indirect efforts were ongoing, the Fars news agency reported that Iran had transmitted “written messages” to the Americans via Pakistan that were “about some of the red lines of the Islamic Republic of Iran, including nuclear issues and the Strait of Hormuz”.

Those messages were not, however, part of any negotiations, Fars said.

While a ceasefire in the US-Israeli war with Iran that began on April 8 has so far held, the economic shockwaves of the war continue to reverberate around the globe.

Iran has sealed off the Strait of Hormuz, cutting off vast quantities of oil, natural gas and fertiliser from the global market, sending prices soaring and raising fears of widespread hunger across the developing world.

There had been hopes for a new round of talks on Saturday, with Witkoff and Kushner due to visit Islamabad, but Trump later told Fox News he had scrapped the trip, saying there was no point “sitting around talking about nothing”.

On Sunday, Trump told the channel: “I said, we’re not doing this anymore. We have all the cards. If they want to talk, they can come to us, or they can call us, you know there is a telephone, we have nice secure lines.”

The president is under growing domestic pressure, with petrol prices in the United States pushed up by Iran’s closure of Hormuz and midterm elections scheduled for November.

‘Very fruitful’

Asked earlier whether halting the trip meant a return to open hostilities, Trump said: “No, it doesn’t mean that.”

Later, after a gunman was arrested at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in Washington, Trump said he did not think the incident was related to Iran but that it would not deter him “from winning the war”.

On Saturday, Araghchi met Pakistan’s military chief Asim Munir, a key mediator, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar, before flying on to Muscat.

He is expected to go to Moscow after the talks in Islamabad, with Russia’s foreign ministry confirming that he would meet President Vladimir Putin.

Araghchi described his initial Pakistan trip as “very fruitful” but signalled scepticism over Washington’s intentions, saying he had “yet to see if the US is truly serious about diplomacy”.

Hormuz blockade deepens

Pressure to end the war has intensified as the Strait of Hormuz remains closed.

But Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards said they had no intention of lifting their blockade, which has roiled energy markets.

“Controlling the Strait of Hormuz and maintaining the shadow of its deterrent effects over America and the White House’s supporters in the region is the definitive strategy of Islamic Iran,” the Guards said on their official Telegram channel.

The United States has imposed a blockade of Iranian ports in retaliation.

In a statement carried by state media, Iran’s military warned that continued US “blockading, banditry and piracy” would draw a response.

Israel strikes Lebanon

On the war’s Lebanese front, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered strikes on Hezbollah and accused the Iran-backed group of violating a ceasefire that was extended this week.

“It must be understood that Hezbollah’s violations are, in practice, dismantling the ceasefire,” Netanyahu said, during Sunday’s weekly cabinet meeting.

Hezbollah itself said it would respond to Israeli ceasefire violations and its “continued occupation of Lebanese territory”.

Lebanese official media said Israel’s military began striking the country’s south after issuing an evacuation warning for seven locations, despite the ceasefire with the Iran-backed group.

“Israeli warplanes launched a strike” in Kfar Tibnit – one of the locations included in the warning – the state-run National News Agency said, adding that there were reports of casualties.

Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israel reserves the right to act against “planned, imminent or ongoing attacks”. — AFP

WASHINGTON, April 27 — President Donald ​Trump said on Sunday Iran could telephone if it wants to negotiate an end to their two-month war and stressed it can never have a nuclear weapon, after Tehran said the US should remove obstacles to a deal, including its blockade of Iran’s ports.

Hopes of reviving peace efforts receded on Saturday when Trump scrapped ‌a visit to Islamabad by his envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi shuttled to and from mediators Pakistan and Oman on Sunday before ​heading to Russia, where he is due to meet President Vladimir Putin.

Oil prices rose, the dollar inched higher and US stock futures wobbled lower in early Asia trade on Monday after US-Iran peace talks stalled over the weekend, leaving Gulf shipping blocked.

“If they want to talk, they can come to us, or they can call us. You know, there is a telephone. We have nice, secure lines,” Trump told “The Sunday Briefing” on Fox News.

“They know what has ​to be in the agreement. It’s very simple: They cannot have a nuclear weapon, otherwise there’s no reason to meet,” Trump said.

Iran has long demanded Washington acknowledge its right to enrich uranium, which Tehran says it only seeks for peaceful purposes, but which Western powers say is aimed at building nuclear weapons.

Although a ceasefire has paused full-scale fighting in the conflict, which began with US-Israeli strikes on Iran on February 28, no agreement has been reached on terms to end a war that has killed thousands, driven up oil prices, fuelled inflation and darkened the outlook for global growth.

Trump faces domestic pressure to end war

With his approval ratings falling, Trump faces domestic pressure to end the unpopular war. Iran’s leaders, though weakened militarily, have ‌found leverage in negotiations with their ability to stop shipping in the economically vital Strait of Hormuz, which normally carries a fifth of global oil shipments.

Tehran has largely closed the strait while Washington ⁠has imposed a blockade of Iranian ports.

Araqchi returned to Islamabad after holding talks on Sunday in Oman, ⁠another mediator in the war, and then headed to Russia.

Iran’s envoy in Russia, Kazem Jalali, said in a post on X that ⁠Araqchi would meet with Putin “in continuation of the diplomatic jihad ⁠to advance the country’s interests and amid external ⁠threats.”

“Iran and Russia are present in a united front in the campaign of the world’s totalitarian forces against independent and justice-seeking countries, as well as countries that seek a world free from unilateralism and Western domination,” Jalali said.

Iranian state media said Araqchi discussed security in the strait with Omani leader Haitham bin Tariq al-Said and called for a regional security framework free of outside interference.

Araqchi said on X that ⁠the focus of his Oman talks “included ways to ensure safe transit that is to benefit of all dear neighbours and the world.”

Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said topics for Araqchi’s talks with Pakistani officials included “implementing a new legal regime over the Strait of Hormuz, receiving compensation, guaranteeing no renewed military aggression by warmongers, and lifting the naval blockade.”

Trump, speaking in Florida on Saturday, said he cancelled his envoys’ visit due to too much travel and expense for what he considered an inadequate Iranian offer. Iran “offered a lot, but not enough,” he said.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif by phone on Saturday that Tehran would not enter “imposed negotiations” under threats or blockade, an Iranian statement said.

He said the United States should first remove obstacles, including its maritime blockade, before negotiators ⁠could begin laying the groundwork for a settlement.

US and Iran have extensive disagreements

Disagreements between the US and Iran extend beyond Tehran’s nuclear program and control of the strait.

Trump wants to limit Iran’s support for its regional proxies, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, and curb its ability to strike US allies with ballistic ⁠missiles. Iran wants a lifting of sanctions and an end to Israeli attacks on Hezbollah.

In talks in Islamabad earlier in April, US Vice President JD Vance led the US delegation opposite Iran’s parliamentary speaker Mohammad ⁠Baqer Qalibaf. They ended without ⁠agreement.

After the latest diplomatic trip was called off, two US Air Force C-17s carrying security staff, equipment and vehicles used to protect US officials flew out of Pakistan, two Pakistani government sources told Reuters on Sunday.

Trump said on ​Saturday there was “tremendous infighting and confusion” within Iran’s leadership.

Pezeshkian said last week there were “no hardliners or moderates” in Tehran and ​that the country stood united behind its supreme leader.

The war has destabilised the Middle East. Iran ‌has struck its Gulf neighbours and conflict between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon has been reignited.

In Lebanon, Israeli strikes killed ​14 people and wounded 37 on Sunday, the health ministry said. ​The Israeli military warned residents to leave seven towns beyond the “buffer zone” it occupied before a ceasefire that has failed to fully halt hostilities. — Reuters

Colonel Vadym Sukharevskyi, 41, is a figure in European history. For Ukraine, he is a hero: the medals he has received attest to this. But his significance transcends his country. The name of Sukharevskyi, the current deputy commander of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in the East, appears in the annals of war not because of the current Russian invasion, which began in 2022, but because of a decision he made on April 13, 2014, in Sloviansk. This city in the Donetsk Oblast, in the Donbas region, remains under Ukrainian control today, largely thanks to him.

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