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Trump pushes back plan for strikes on Iran

US creates fund for Ukrainian children WASHINGTON: The United States announced the creation of a US$25 million fund on Thursday to help with the return of Ukrainian children forcibly relocated to Russia. The fund would be used for “the identification, return and rehabilitation of Ukrainian children and youth who have been forcibly transferred or otherwise held away from their families and communities,“ the US State Department said in a statement. According to Kyiv, nearly 20,000 Ukrainian children have been forcibly taken to Russia since Moscow’s February 2022 invasion. The statement also said the fund would support two kinds of programmes: identifying and tracking displaced children, and supporting their reintegration into society. Ukrainian First Lady Olena Zelenska welcomed the creation of the fund, saying on X that “all Ukrainian children must return.” She met with two senior State Department officials, Riley Barnes and Jeremy Lewin in Washington, who are respectively in charge of human rights and humanitarian aid. The issue is highly sensitive in Ukraine and remains central to every new round of negotiations for a potential peace agreement between Kyiv and Moscow. A UN international commission of inquiry recently accused Moscow of committing “crimes against humanity” by forcibly deporting thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia and obstructing their return. Russia maintains that it transferred Ukrainian children from captured areas for their own safety and is prepared to return them to their families under conditions it deems appropriate. Small groups of children have been repatriated through various intermediaries, including US First Lady Melania Trump. Last year, the Trump administration cut funding to a humanitarian research lab at Yale University that had been collecting data to track the displaced children. – AFP ‘No indication weapons diverted’ BRUSSELS: Ukraine has no indication that the United States plans to redirect weapons intended for Kyiv to the Middle East, the Ukrainian ambassador to Nato told AFP on Thursday. The Washington Post reported the Pentagon was considering whether to divert kit as the war in Iran depletes US stocks. The equipment was reported to include air-defence interceptor missiles ordered under a scheme allowing allies to buy US weapons for Ukraine. “We have received no signals, either from Nato or from the United States, that weapons allocated to Ukraine under the PURL programme could be redirected to the Middle East,“ said Ukrainian envoy to Nato Alyona Getmanchuk. “Nor have there been any indications that the war in Iran has led to changes in the availability of the necessary weapons for Ukraine within the framework of PURL.” The PURL programme, launched last year, allows Ukraine to receive US equipment financed by European countries. Earlier, Nato chief Mark Rutte said Kyiv was still getting essential defence equipment despite the Iran war depleting stockpiles both in Europe and the United States. “The good news is that essential equipment into Ukraine continues to flow,“ he told reporters. He added that the supply included US-made Patriot missile interceptors, which Ukraine desperately needs. He also said some 75% of the missiles used by Patriot batteries in Ukraine have been supplied through the programme, and 90% of the munitions used by other air-defence systems. – AFP

o New deadline set for April 6 for Tehran to make deal

The war has massively disrupted shipping, sending crude oil prices up by about 40%, seen liquefied natural gas prices spike, and prices for nitrogen-based fertilizers, critical to food production, rise by about 50%. Despite Trump’s upbeat assessment, Iran continued to retaliate against US and Israeli strikes by hitting Israel and US bases. It also struck Gulf states and effectively blocked Middle East fuel exports via the Strait of Hormuz, which carries about 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas. Trump on Thursday suggested that Iran let 10 oil tankers transit the strait as a goodwill gesture in negotiations, including some Pakistan-flagged vessels. Trump said the US would become the Iran’s “worst nightmare” if it did not comply with US demands, which include opening the Strait of Hormuz and ending its nuclear program. He said taking control of Iran’s oil was an option, but gave no details. The Pentagon was looking at sending up to 10,000 additional ground troops to the Middle East, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing officials at the department. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment. – Reuters

“Talks are ongoing and, despite erroneous statements to the contrary by the ‘Fake News Media,’ and others, they are going very well,” he said in his Truth Social post. Iran has said it is not engaged in talks with Washington and Trump has not identified who the US is negotiating with in Iran, with many high-ranking officials killed in the war. On March 23, Trump announced a halt to all threatened strikes against power plants and energy infrastructure for a five-day period, but has now extended it to 10 days. Iran did not ask for a 10-day pause on such strikes, the Wall Street Journal cited peace talk mediators as saying. Trump told Fox News’ “The Five” programme that the Iranians had asked for a seven-day pause on strikes on energy plants. There was no immediate reaction from Tehran. Iran has said it would return strikes on energy facilities in the Gulf region if Trump follows through with his threat. The prospect of tit-for-tat strikes on civilian infrastructure could further rattle global markets and threaten the livelihoods of millions of civilians in the region who rely on electricity to power their cities and supply fresh water.

WASHINGTON: United States President Donald Trump said he would extend the deadline to April 6 for Iran to make a deal to end the war, or face the destruction of its energy plants, adding that talks were going “very well”. The four-week war has spread across the Middle East, killing thousands and hitting the global economy with soaring energy prices, fuelling global inflation fears. The US and Israel launched strikes on Iran on Feb 28 after talks about Tehran’s nuclear program failed to yield a deal. Trump on Thursday threatened during a cabinet meeting at the White House to increase pressure on Iran if it did not make a deal. He later posted on social media that he would pause threatened attacks on Iranian energy plants for 10 days until April 6, 2026 at 2000 EDT (0000 GMT on April 7).

FURRY FRIENDS ... A displaced Palestinian with an injured arm holds kittens as he shelters in a tent camp in Gaza City. – REUTERS P I C

Lebanon to lodge complaint over Israeli attacks BEIRUT: Fighting between Israel and

border including Nahariya and a Defence Ministry complex in Tel Aviv. Israel this week said its military would take control of south Lebanon up to the Litani River, about 30km from the border. Human Rights Watch said on X that the area amounts to about 8%of Lebanon’s territory “and is larger than Bahrain, New York City or Singapore. It is twice the size of Gaza”. A military source in south Lebanon told AFP the Israeli army was “slowly advancing a bit more each day” in the border area, including near the town of Taybeh where Hezbollah has claimed repeated attacks against Israeli troops. The Committee to Protect Journalists urged an investigation into the killing of Hussain Hamood, a freelance journalist who worked for Hezbollah-affiliated Al-Manar TV, who it said was killed in an Israeli strike in Nabatiyeh a day earlier. – AFP

Lebanese state media said Israeli strikes killed at least five individuals on Thursday, two of them in a raid on a building in the Nabatiyeh area in the south. AFP images showed a badly damaged building and smoke rising from the rubble, as rescue workers and firefighters attended at the scene. Israel’s military said two soldiers were killed in south Lebanon, raising the death toll for its troops there this month to four. Israeli emergency services also said a rocket fired from Lebanon killed a man in northern Israel’s Nahariya area. Hezbollah on Thursday claimed dozens of attacks, saying its fighters targeted or clashed with soldiers in several south Lebanon areas including Naqura and Khiam, a strategic town that has seen intense fighting. It also said it targeted sites across the

Hezbollah on Thursday claimed casualties on both sides as Lebanon said it would complain to the United Nations Security Council over Israeli attacks. In a sign of divisions, Lebanese ministers from Hezbollah and its ally Amal boycotted a cabinet session over the government decision this week to declare the Iranian ambassador persona non grata , as demonstrators rallied in support of Iran outside its embassy in Beirut. Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war on March 2 when Tehran-backed Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel to avenge the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of Iran. Israel has since been bombing Lebanon, mainly in areas where Hezbollah has long held sway, and has sent in ground troops in a push to establish a buffer zone in south Lebanon.