Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said he, along with his Iranian and Turkish counterparts, are calling for “an end to hostile activities” in Syria, where opposition fighters have made a rapid advance in a major challenge to President Bashar al-Assad.
Speaking to Al Jazeera at the Doha Forum in the Qatari capital on Saturday, Lavrov said Russia, Iran and Turkiye expressed support for “dialogue between the government and legitimate opposition” in Syria.
The three countries have been involved since 2017 in the so-called Astana Format talks seeking a political settlement in Syria, and their top diplomats – Lavrov, Iran’s Abbas Araghchi and Turkiye’s Hakan Fidan met in a trilateral format on the sidelines of the Doha Forum.
“We called for [an] immediate end to hostile activities. We stated, all of us, that we want the [United Nations] Resolution 2254 to be fully implemented, and for this purpose, called for the dialogue between the government and legitimate opposition,” Lavrov said.
Syria-led process
Resolution 2254 (PDF) outlines a commitment to the “sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity” of Syria and says the only solution to the years-long conflict will be through “an inclusive and Syrian-led political process”.
Asked whether Moscow – a key backer of al-Assad and the Syrian army – believes the Syrian president can hang on to power, Lavrov said he was “not in the business of guessing”.
“We agreed today with Iran and Turkiye to issue a strong call, which I described, and we will be doing some specific steps to make sure that this call is heeded,” he said.
Minister of Foreign Affairs @HakanFidan attended the Astana-format meeting at the 22nd Doha Forum, with his Iranian and Russian counterparts. 🇹🇷🇮🇷🇷🇺 pic.twitter.com/1lA7HIg4XL
Lavrov’s comments came as fighters led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) armed group have made a lightning advance in Syria over days, taking control of key cities, including Aleppo and Hama.
Late on Friday, the rebels said they had reached the edge of Homs, a strategic city linking the capital Damascus to coastal parts of the country where al-Assad enjoys support from the Alawite community.
In a post on Telegram on Saturday afternoon, an opposition commander said the HTS-led group’s forces had begun “operations” inside Homs.
Opposition fighters have also made gains in Deraa and Sweida, in southwestern Syria near the border with Jordan, and taken control of some towns in the Damascus countryside.
‘Much weaker’
Reporting from Kilis, near Turkiye’s border with Syria, Al Jazeera’s Resul Serdar said the Syrian government has lost control of a majority of the country’s territory.
“We are seeing a Syrian government that is much weaker than in 2016, when it was backed strongly by Russia, by Iran, by [Lebanese group] Hezbollah on the ground,” he said.
“Russians are extremely busy in Ukraine. They have withdrawn a majority of their military equipment and personnel from the Khmeimim airbase [in Syria] to Ukraine,” Serdar explained, while Iran and Hezbollah have also been embroiled in fighting against Israel.
“All of these factors have created such a vacuum.”
At Saturday’s Doha Forum, Lavrov said Russia was “absolutely convinced of the inadmissibility to use terrorists like HTS to achieve geopolitical purposes”.
“We’re trying to do everything not to allow terrorists to prevail; even if they say they are no longer terrorists,” he said.
Downplaying fears
Samuel Ramani, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, said the Russian foreign minister “was trying to project an image of strength and being in control”.
“He was trying to downplay fears that al-Assad’s regime in Syria is on the imminent brink of collapse, instead talking about how he’s doing all he can to promote the sovereignty of Syria and to try to stabilise the situation,” he told Al Jazeera.
Ramani said the opposition forces’ rapid advance appears to have caught Moscow off-guard.
“They have been watching and they have been spectators just like us to what’s unfolding in Syria, and they don’t really seem to have a very clear game plan to keep al-Assad in power.”
Ricardo Bonilla is the second finance minister to depart Petro’s government, which faces legislative hurdles and probes.
A key member of President Gustavo Petro’s government in Colombia has resigned, amid the latest corruption scandal to rock the administration.
Finance Minister Ricardo Bonilla stepped down from his office on Wednesday, though he remained defiant in the face of accusations that he diverted funds from Colombia’s disaster relief agency and bought votes on a congressional committee involved with government finances.
“I leave with my head held high, confident that I will convince my investigators that I did not buy silence nor votes from congressmen,” Bonilla wrote on social media.
He denied committing any crimes. “The defence I am undertaking with my legal team is supported by truth and transparency.”
President Petro, Colombia’s first left-wing president, has weathered a string of scandals and legislative setbacks since taking office in 2022. But he stood by Bonilla, even as he accepted the minister’s resignation.
“I know that the accusation against Bonilla is unfair,” Petro wrote in one of two lengthy missives on social media, describing Bonilla as a “true economist, committed to the necessities of his people”.
But, Petro added, “politics and law continued to be based on corruption” in Colombia.
Petro quickly replaced Bonilla with his vice minister of finance, Diego Guevara, on Wednesday afternoon.
Bonilla was the second finance minister to exit Petro’s government. He took over for Jose Antonio Ocampo in 2023, after Petro abruptly reshuffled his cabinet.
The scandal that brought Bonilla down emerged earlier this year when the public prosecutor’s office opened an investigation into hefty contracts for the National Unit for Disaster Risk Management, or UNGRD.
Some purchases allegedly involved $10.5m contracts for defective water tankers destined for the province of La Guajira, where residents struggle to access potable water.
The former head of UNGRD was accused of influence peddling, in a scandal that grew to include Bonilla himself.
Colombia’s Supreme Court has since indicated its investigation hinges on alleged “crimes of bribery and possible illicit enrichment”.
The former deputy director of UNGRD, Sneyder Pinilla — who himself is under investigation — has since become a cooperating witness. His lawyers have said he provided evidence of a “criminal structure” linking UNGRD to high-ranking federal officials.
But Petro has largely rejected accusations of corruption within his government.
In October, for instance, when election officials announced they were investigating possible campaign finance violations in Petro’s historic bid for office, the president framed the efforts as sabotage.
“The coup has begun,” Petro wrote on social media.
That probe is also ongoing and involves not only Petro but also his former campaign manager Ricardo Roa.
Petro’s son, Nicolas Petro, also received house arrest in 2023 for allegedly accepting money from individuals with ties to drug trafficking, though he has denied his father, the president, knew anything about the scheme.
President Petro tied the cases together in his statement on Wednesday about Bonilla’s resignation.
There are people, he wrote on social media, who want to use the scandal involving Bonilla “to make the economic policy of the government collapse”.
“They are the same ones who now say that Bonilla denounced Roa and my son, when it is simply an anonymous liar from the month of October handed over to the Ministry of Finance,” Petro claimed.
“They want to divide us in fights that they themselves invent.”
Chinese President Xi Jinping has held his final meeting with his outgoing counterpart in the United States, Democrat Joe Biden.
But Xi’s words on Saturday seemed directed not simply at Biden but at his Republican successor, returning President Donald Trump.
In his encounter with Biden on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Lima, Peru, Xi emphasised the importance of the US and China maintaining “mutual respect”.
While Xi did not mention Trump by name, he gave a nod to the incoming US president’s victory in the November 5 election.
“The United States has recently concluded its elections. China’s goal of a stable, healthy and sustainable China-US relationship remains unchanged,” Xi said.
But, he warned, “If we take each other as rival or adversary, pursue vicious competition and seek to hurt each other, we would roil the relationship or even set it back.”
Trump, who served as president previously from 2017 to 2021, oversaw a period of heightened tensions with China, including a trade war sparked by his imposition of tariffs on Chinese goods.
On Saturday, Xi appeared to extend a hand of friendship to Trump, encouraging their countries to work together for mutual gain.
“China is ready to work with the new US administration to maintain communication, expand cooperation and manage differences so as to strive for a steady transition of the China-US relationship for the benefit of the two peoples,” he said.
US President Joe Biden and China’s President Xi Jinping attend a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the APEC Summit in Lima, Peru, on November 16 [Leah Millis/Reuters]
A major campaign theme
Trump has reprised his “America First” philosophy as he prepares to enter the White House for a second time.
China was a repeated feature of the Republican’s campaign speeches, as he led a successful bid for re-election in the 2024 US presidential race.
As part of a pitch to American voters, Trump pledged to protect US manufacturing from Chinese competition.
“I charged China hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes and tariffs. They paid us,” Trump boasted at his final campaign rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on November 4.
“And you know what? We’re going to get along great with China. We’re going to get along good. I want to get along with them. President Xi was great until COVID came. Then, I wasn’t so thrilled with him.”
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump blamed the Chinese leader for letting the virus spread by “allowing flights to leave China and infect the world”. He also repeatedly called COVID-19 the “China virus”.
Despite their rocky history, Xi called to congratulate Trump on his second term the day after the election, on November 6.
Xi has led the Chinese government since 2013, and under his authority, the two-term limit was abolished for presidents.
Trump has expressed admiration for Xi’s authority over the Chinese government, which some critics compare with authoritarian rule.
“I got along very well with President Xi. He’s a great guy. He wrote me a beautiful note the other day when he heard about what happened,” Trump said after the assassination attempt on him in July. “It’s a good thing to get along, not a bad thing.”
Goodbye to Biden
Xi and Biden have had their own rocky history, with incidents like the 2023 downing of an alleged Chinese “spy” balloon fuelling spikes in tensions.
China maintained that the balloon was a civilian aircraft collecting weather data, and it denounced the US’s decision to shoot it down with a missile after it passed over sensitive US military installations.
Biden, who turns 82 on Wednesday, exchanged some banter with his Chinese counterpart as they spoke to reporters in their final meeting.
“Can you put on your earpiece? We have simultaneous interpreting,” Xi asked Biden at their afternoon news conference.
Biden responded with a joke. “I’ve learned to speak Chinese,” he said with a chuckle.
The US president continued by acknowledging that relations have not always been smooth between their two countries.
“We haven’t always agreed, but our conversations have always been candid and always been frank. We have never kidded one another. We’ve been level with one another. And I think that’s vital,” Biden said, pointing across the table as he read from prepared remarks.
“These conversations prevent miscalculations, and they ensure the competition between our two countries will not veer into conflict.”
He used his final encounter as president with Xi to push several US priorities. In a readout released by the White House, Biden reportedly pushed for greater law enforcement cooperation to stem the flow of synthetic drugs to the US.
He and Xi also spoke about the emerging challenges posed by artificial intelligence (AI), including with regards to its use with nuclear weapons.
“The two leaders affirmed the need to maintain human control over the decision to use nuclear weapons,” the readout explained.
“The two leaders also stressed the need to consider carefully the potential risks and develop AI technology in the military field in a prudent and responsible manner.”
Biden also confirmed that the US’s “one China policy” remained “unchanged”: The US acknowledges the government in Beijing as the sole government of China. It does not have formal diplomatic relations with the self-governing island of Taiwan, which China considers its territory.
China has called acknowledging Taiwan’s sovereignty a “red line” in its relationship with the US.
While Biden has previously pledged to protect Taiwan should it ever face attack, on Saturday, he struck a note of peace, calling for a continuation of the status quo.
“He reiterated that the United States opposes any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side, that we expect cross-Strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means, and that the world has an interest in peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” the White House readout said.
But, it added, Biden also “called for an end to destabilizing PRC [People’s Republic of China] military activity around Taiwan”.
As the war enters its 958th day, these are the main developments.
Here is the situation on Thursday, October 10, 2024.
Fighting
At least six people were killed and eight injured after a Russian ballistic missile attack on the port infrastructure of Ukraine’s southern Odesa region. Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Kuleba said a Panamanian-flagged container ship, the Shui Spirit, was damaged in the attack, the third in the region in the past four days.
Ukraine’s military said it struck a base in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region where Shahed drones were being stored. A statement by the General Staff said the attack was carried out jointly by naval forces and the SBU intelligence service. There was no official comment from Russia, although emergency services reported a large fire around the location of the alleged attack.
Ukraine said it also hit a Russian weapons arsenal in the Bryansk region where ammunition for missile and artillery weapons, including those delivered from North Korea, was stored. Bryansk authorities later declared a state of emergency following “detonations of explosive objects”.
Russia’s air defence units destroyed 47 Ukrainian drones targeting its western regions, the Ministry of Defence said. Regional officials said there were no reports of casualties.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had retaken the villages of Novaya Sorochina and Pokrovsky in its Kursk region after they were captured by Ukraine in a surprise August offensive.
Politics and diplomacy
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told a summit of southeast European leaders in Croatia that there was an “opportunity” to take “decisive action” to end the war in 2025. The Ukrainian president did not spell out how and why he saw such an opportunity.
Zelenskyy, who is urging Ukraine’s Western allies to allow it to use long-range weapons on military targets deep inside Russia, is due to hold talks with French President Emmanuel Macron, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer as well as Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in meetings across Europe on Thursday.
European Union envoys approved a plan to loan Ukraine as much as 35 billion euros ($38bn) backed by frozen Russian central bank assets.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Hungary was putting European security at risk as a result of its close ties with Russia. Speaking at a debate with populist Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at the European Parliament, von der Leyen took aim at Budapest’s reluctance to join EU partners in helping Ukraine against Russia’s invasion. “The world has witnessed the atrocities of Russia’s war. And yet, there are still some who blame this war not on the invader but the invaded,” she said.
Ukrainian investigators said they arrested 24-year-old Serhiy Gnezdilov, a soldier who fled his army unit in protest over the lack of term limits for long-serving troops, for desertion. Gnezdilov faces as many as 12 years in prison if found guilty.
A Russian court found Trevor Reed, a former US Marine who was freed in a 2022 prisoner swap, guilty in absentia of serving as a mercenary for Ukraine and handed him a 14.5-year prison sentence. Investigators said Reed had joined Ukraine’s military in July 2023.
A Russian court sentenced activist Yevgeny Mishchenko to 12 years in a penal colony for allegedly planning to join the Freedom of Russia Legion, a banned unit of Russians supporting Ukraine. Mishchenko was one of a handful of volunteers guarding a makeshift Moscow memorial to Boris Nemtsov, an opposition politician killed in 2015. The case was based on evidence from a security agent who posed as a volunteer at the memorial and recorded conversations with Mishchenko.
Ukraine aims to organise a new peace summit by the end of this year and wants Russia to attend this time, Vasyl Bodnar, its ambassador to Turkey said. He ruled out any direct bilateral talks with Moscow at the meeting, saying any discussions were likely to take place through third-party intermediaries.
In the US, presidential elections are decided by a state-based vote allocation system. Here’s what you need to know.
It’s at the heart of how presidential elections in the United States are decided. But for many, the Electoral College is a mystery, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in an enigma.
It doesn’t have to be confusing, though.
To understand the Electoral College system, you first have to know that US presidents are not elected by the national popular vote: the total number of votes each candidate receives.
Instead, a group of 538 so-called “electors” select the president. These electors make up the Electoral College.
So who are these electors?
Before the election, the political parties in each state choose a slate of electors: real people who ultimately cast a vote for the president. Very often, the electors are party officials or supporters.
Each state gets the same number of electors as it has representatives in the US House of Representatives and the US Senate.
For example, Michigan gets 15 Electoral College votes. That corresponds to the two senators and 13 House members that represent the state in Congress.
Now that we know who these electors are and how many represent each state, how are their votes allocated? Here’s where it gets fun.
In nearly all the states across the US, the presidential candidate who gets the most votes wins all that state’s electors: It’s a winner-takes-all system. Even if a candidate wins a state narrowly, they still get all the electors.
The outliers are Maine and Nebraska, which allocate their electors based on a more complicated system that reflects the popular vote on the state and congressional district levels.
The District of Columbia — which is not a state but encompasses the country’s capital — also gets three Electoral College votes.
But here is the most important part: To win the White House, a presidential candidate must win the support of a majority of the electors.
So out of a total of 538 Electoral College votes, they need at least 270 to win.
The electors ultimately cast their votes in December, about a month after the election.
Their votes are then certified by Congress in early January, when the president is confirmed and takes office.
So what does this all mean?
Effectively, to win the US presidency, a candidate has to win support in enough key states to reach that magic Electoral College number of 270.
Under this system, a candidate who wins the popular vote — the most votes in total across the US — may not actually win the White House.
One recent example came in 2016, when Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton won the popular vote but lost the election to Republican Donald Trump. His victory was buoyed by wins in states like Florida and Pennsylvania, each of which offered at least 20 Electoral College votes.
The Electoral College system was designed, in effect, to ensure the political power of the states.
Some Americans say the Electoral College should be scrapped in favour of the popular vote. Others argue the system ensures highly populated states do not overshadow smaller ones, thereby encouraging minority representation in US democracy.
