18/04/2025

FRIDAY | APR 18, 2025

9

25 killed in airstrikes on displaced people

Trump calls Harvard ‘a joke’ WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump called Harvard a “joke” on Wednesday and said it should lose its government research contracts after the prestigious university refused demands that it accept outside political supervision. Trump’s administration also threatened to ban the famed seat of learning from accepting foreign students unless it bowed to the requirements, as media reported that officials were considering revoking the university’s tax exempt status. “Harvard can no longer be considered a decent place of learning, and should not be considered on any list of the World’s Great Universities or Colleges,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform. Trump is furious at the institution for rejecting his demand to submit to government supervision on admissions, hiring and political slant. Other institutions, including Columbia University, have bowed to less far-ranging demands from the administration, which claims that the educational elite is too left-wing. Harvard rejected the pressure, with its president, Alan Garber, saying that the university refuses to “negotiate over its independence or constitutional rights”. Trump this week ordered the freezing of US$2.2 billion (RM9.7 billion) in federal funding to Harvard and said the university “should lose its tax exempt status” as a nonprofit educational institution if it did not back down. CNN and The Washington Post reported that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was making plans to do so following a request from Trump. White House Deputy Press Secretary Harrison Fields said “any forthcoming actions by the IRS will be conducted independently of the president”. The Department of Homeland Security said “if Harvard cannot verify it is in full compliance with its reporting requirements, the university will lose the privilege of enrolling foreign students”. – AFP MOSCOW: Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani arrived in Moscow yesterday for talks with President Vladimir Putin on Ukraine and Middle East issues. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the two leaders would have a “serious conversation” on issues and sign agreements. “It is difficult to overestimate the role of Qatar in many regional and world affairs. Qatar is our good partner, relations are developing dynamically, contacts between the heads of state are quite frequent,” Peskov told reporters. Qatar has made attempts to mediate between Russia and Ukraine, and has helped arrange the return of children from both countries who were separated from their parents during the war. Russia and Qatar said this week that the leaders would discuss efforts to find a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine. President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he wants to end the “bloodbath”, but has yet to achieve a breakthrough. Moscow has said it is not easy to agree a settlement. Qatar’s Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Mohammed Al-Khulaifi told TASS news agency that the emir’s talks with Putin would touch on Ukraine, Syria, the Gaza Strip and energy such as liquefied natural gas. – Reuters Qatari emir to clinch key deals

Rafah and pushed inland up to the “Morag corridor” that runs from the eastern edge of Gaza to the Mediterranean Sea, between Rafah and the city of Khan Younis. It already held a wide corridor across the central Netzarim area and has extended a buffer zone all around the frontier hundreds of metres inland, including the Shejaia area just to the east of Gaza City. Israel says its forces have killed hundreds of gunmen, including many senior Hamas commanders, since March 18 but the operation has alarmed the United Nations and European countries. More than 400,000 Palestinians have been displaced since hostilities resumed on March 18 after two months of relative calm, according to UN humanitarian agency OCHA, and Israeli airstrikes and bombardments have killed at least 1,630 people. Medical charity MSF said Gaza had become a “mass grave” with humanitarian groups struggling to provide aid. “We are witnessing in real time the destruction and forced displacement of the entire population in Gaza,” said Amande Bazerolle, MSF’s emergency coordinator in Gaza. – AFP/Reuters

GAZA CITY: Gaza’s civil defence agency reported yesterday that a wave of Israeli air strikes hit encampments for displaced Palestinians across the territory, killing at least 25 people. Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal said a strike targeted several tents in the Al-Mawasi area of the southern city of Khan Younis, resulting in 16 deaths. “At least 16 martyrs, most of them women and children, and 23 others were wounded following a direct strike by two Israeli missiles on several tents housing displaced o Israeli troops to remain in buffer zones

zone” extending deep into Gaza and squeezing more than 2 million Palestinians into ever smaller areas in the south and along the coastline. “Unlike in the past, the IDF is not evacuating areas that have been cleared and seized,” Katz said in a statement following a meeting with military commanders. “The IDF will remain in the security zones as a buffer between the enemy and the communities in any temporary or permanent situation in Gaza – as in Lebanon and Syria.” In a summary of its operations over the past month, the Israeli military said it now controls 30% of the tiny Palestinian territory. In southern Gaza alone, Israeli forces have seized the border city of

families in the Al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis,” Bassal said. According to Bassal, two additional strikes on other encampments of displaced people killed eight and wounded several more. Seven were killed in a strike on tents in the northern town of Beit Lahia, while another attack near the Al-Mawasi area killed a father and his child who were living in a tent, Bassal said. Defence Minister Israel Katz said on Wednesday Israeli troops will remain in the buffer zones they have created in Gaza even after any settlement to end the war. Since resuming military operations last month, Israeli forces have carved out a broad “security

A vehicle moves along a partially-demolished road ahead of a military bulldozer during an army operation in Tulkarem, West Bank, on Wednesday. – AFPPIC

UN nuclear chief in Tehran for talks TEHRAN: UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi met the head of Iran’s atomic energy agency, Mohammad Eslami, yesterday ahead of a fresh round of nuclear talks between Tehran and Washington. On Wednesday, Grossi met Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who led the first round of talks with US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff on Saturday. Araghchi said he had a “useful” meeting with the International Atomic Energy Agency chief.

Witkoff previously demanded only that Iran return to the 3.67% enrichment ceiling set by the 2015 deal. Araghchi said he hoped to start negotiations on the framework of a possible agreement, but that this required “constructive positions” from the United States. “If we continue to (hear) contradictory and conflicting positions, we are going to have problems,” he warned. Iran’s top diplomat headed to Moscow yesterday on a “pre planned” visit. The Kremlin said that Russia stood ready to do “everything” in its power to help resolve the nuclear programme standoff. – AFP had

indispensable to provide credible assurances about the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear programme at a time when diplomacy is urgently needed,” he said on X. Before heading to Iran, Grossi told French newspaper Le Monde that Tehran was “not far” from possessing a nuclear bomb. On Tuesday, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei cautioned that while the talks with the United States had started well, they could yet prove fruitless. “The negotiations may or may not yield results,” he said. On Wednesday, Araghchi said Iran’s enrichment of uranium was not up for discussion after Witkoff called for a halt.

Iranian and US delegations are to gather in Rome tomorrow for a second round of Omani-mediated negotiations, a week after the longtime foes held their highest level talks since President Donald Trump abandoned a landmark nuclear accord in 2018. There were no immediate details on Grossi’s meeting with Eslami, but Iran’s reformist Shargh newspaper described his visit as “strategically significant at the current juncture”.

“The IAEA can play a crucial role in peaceful settlement of the Iranian nuclear file in the coming months,” he said. Araghchi called on the IAEA chief to “keep the agency away from politics” in the face of “spoilers” seeking to “derail current negotiations”. He did not elaborate. Grossi said their meeting was “important”. “Cooperation with IAEA is