10/03/2025

MONDAY | MAR 10, 2025

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Hamas pushes for phase two of truce talks

MAN ARRESTED AFTER SCALING BIG BEN LONDON: A man who scaled Big Ben, and spent the day perched on the clock tower with a Palestinian flag, was arrested shortly after he came down after midnight yesterday. Pictures showed a cherry picker transporting him to waiting emergency crews on the ground. The man spent the day perched barefoot on a ledge several metres up the landmark, even as emergency crews urged him to come down from the Elizabeth Tower in central London, more commonly known for its clock bell, Big Ben. Negotiators had boarded a fire truck lift and used a megaphone to speak with the man, but footage on social media showed the figure in a hoodie and baseball cap saying: “I will come down on my own terms.” – AFP PESHAWAR: At least four Pakistani paramilitary troops were killed when gunmen attacked a security checkpoint in a northwestern border region. The attack occurred in Kurram district, located on the border with Afghanistan, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where there has been a rise in violence in recent years. “Heavily armed militants” launched the attack early yesterday, a police official said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media. “At least four security personnel were martyred, and seven others injured,” he said. – AFP FOUR PARAMILITARY TROOPS SHOT DEAD Khamenei slams ‘bullying’ after Trump threats TEHRAN: Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Saturday slammed what he described as bullying tactics a day after US President Donald Trump threatened military action. “Some bully governments – I really don’t know of any more appropriate term for some foreign figures and leaders than the word bullying – insist on negotiations,” Khamenei told officials after Trump threatened military action if Iran refuses to engage in talks on its nuclear programme. “Their negotiations are not aimed at solving problems, they aim at domination,” Khamenei said. On Friday, Trump said he had written to Iran’s supreme leader, urging new talks on the nuclear programme but warning of possible military action if it refuses. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran had yet to receive any letter from the US president by Saturday. “We have heard of it (the letter) but we haven’t received anything,” he told state television. Khamenei accused the bullying powers of setting new conditions they did not expect Iran to meet. “They are setting new expectations that they think will definitely not be met by Iran,” he said, without naming the United States or referring to Trump’s comments. On Friday, Araghchi told AFP in an interview that Iran would not negotiate under “maximum pressure”. Tehran has in recent months engaged in diplomatic efforts with the three European parties to the deal – Britain, France and Germany – aimed at resolving issues surrounding its nuclear ambitions. – AFP

BR I E F S

o Indicators positive, says spokesman

floated a widely condemned plan to relocate Palestinians from Gaza, prompting Arab leaders to offer an alternative. Their proposal would see Gaza’s reconstruction financed through a trust fund, with the Palestinian Authority returning to govern the territory. “We need more discussion about it, but it’s a good-faith first step,” Steve Witkoff, Trump’s Middle East envoy, said in response to the plan. Witkoff will be returning to the region this week as he travels to Saudi Arabia for talks on Ukraine. At their regular weekend rally in Tel Aviv, families of Israeli hostages demanded the government fully implement the ceasefire. “The war could resume in a week – they have even picked a name for the operation,” Einav Zangauker, the mother of Matan Zangauker, told the crowd. “The war won’t bring the hostages home, it will kill them.” Recently released hostages have also joined those beseeching Netanyahu to implement the ceasefire. – AFP boulders that were quarried in the Chihuahua Desert of his nearby home country. The work is titled The Act of Being Together . Arranged to invoke megalithic structures like Britain’s Stonehenge, the giant hewn marble lumps also speak to the “current climate of events” in which tariffs have recently been hiked at the border. “Rocks like these remind us that things are here to stay, and these inconveniences come and go,” said Davila. Still, Desert X artistic director Neville Wakefield conceded that President Donald Trump’s tariffs, and Mexican reciprocal measures, had made organising an art event a two hour drive from the border “very complicated”. The show brings artists from around the world to make installations specific to the North American desert landscape, sourcing and fabricating many materials from Mexico. Other installations include Ronald Rael’s Adobe Oasis , which used an enormous robotic arm to 3D-print walls made of clay and straw, in the adobe style traditional in this region. Rael suggested the ancient building material, which is fireproof, should be reappraised in the wake of the deadly Los Angeles fires that killed 29 people in January. “This is mankind’s oldest building material,” modified only by “the introduction of one tool, a robot. The recent fires “burned buildings that are made of plastics – toxic materials – and people in LA still can’t drink their own water,” Rael said. Desert X runs until May 11. – AFP

Valley, 160km east of Los Angeles. French-American artist Sarah Meyohas used intricately curved metallic mirrors to reflect and refract the bright desert sunlight, beaming the words Truth Arrives in Slanted Beam s across the sides of a meandering 120m stucco ribbon. “Truth is definitely something that’s at stake in today’s world,” she explained.“And I try to make art that Hamas spokesperson Abdel Latif Al-Qanoua said indicators were so far “positive”. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said it would send delegates to Doha on Monday. Israel has maintained it wants an extension of the truce’s first phase until mid-April. That initial period ended on March 1 after six weeks of relative calm that included the exchange of 25 living hostages and eight bodies for the release of about 1,800 Palestinian prisoners held in Israel. The truce largely halted more than 15 months of fighting in Gaza, where virtually the entire population was displaced by Israel’s relentless military campaign. It also enabled the flow of vital food, shelter and medical assistance into Gaza. After Israel turned the pipeline off again, UN rights experts accused the government of “weaponising starvation”. Displaced Palestinian widow Haneen al-Dura said she and her children spent a month and a half living on the street “among dogs

is not tricking anybody. This isn’t a trick. This is the light. And this is true.” Using “caustic” technology based on the way light “plays at the bottom of a swimming pool” to turn sun beams into text, the work speaks to “a world in which we are so politically divided”, she said. Twenty miles across the desert, Mexican artist Jose Davila has stacked colossal 16-tonne marble Of the 251 hostages taken by gunmen, 58 remain in Gaza, including five Americans. Four American captives have been confirmed dead, while one, Edan Alexander, is believed to be alive. The White House said Trump met eight of the freed captives, who “expressed gratitude” for his efforts to bring them home. The US president previously and rats” before receiving a tent. “As the family’s provider, it was distressing and I couldn’t sleep at all during the night,” she said. Last week, President Donald Trump threatened further destruction of Gaza if all remaining hostages are not released, issuing what he called a “last warning” to Hamas leaders. Hamas said Trump’s threats would only encourage Israel to ignore the terms of their truce. The Trump administration has also confirmed the start of unprecedented direct talks with Hamas, which Washington had previously refused contact with since designating it a terrorist organisation in 1997.

PALESTINIAN TERRITORIES: Hamas reiterated yesterday its insistence on moving directly into negotiating a second phase of the Gaza truce, as Israel announced it would dispatch a delegation to Doha for further talks. Representatives of the group met mediators in Cairo over the weekend, emphasising the need for humanitarian aid to re-enter the besieged territory “without restrictions or conditions”, according to a Hamas press release. The high-level delegation also stressed the need for “moving directly to begin negotiations for the second phase” of the deal, which will aim to lay the groundwork for a permanent ceasefire. Hamas’ demands for the second phase include a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, an end to the blockade, the reconstruction of the territory and financial support.

Desert X returns to California PALM SPRINGS: Mysterious

metallic mirrors, stacks of imported marble boulders and a 3D-printed mud hut appeared in the California desert on Saturday, as the biennial outdoor art festival Desert X returned. The free event, which drew 600,000 visitors in its last edition, sends contemporary art-lovers on a treasure hunt to find works scattered across the Coachella

Meyohas poses in front of her piece Truth Arrives in Slanted Beams . – AFPPIC