Ukraine seeks €76bn in US-made weapons and defense systems

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September 27, 2025

Moldova's high-stakes vote: Democracy v disinformation — Supporters of the ruling Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) during a pro-EU rally yesterday, on the final day of the electoral campaign in Chisinau, Moldova

On the Eve of Decision: Moldova’s Tightrope Between Europe and Moscow

There is a crispness to the air in Chisinau that feels like expectation: flags flutter, campaign posters peel at the edges, and the city’s cafés—where students sip black coffee under chestnut trees—are full of hushed debates. For a nation of roughly 2.4 million people, this ordinary evening hum carries extraordinary weight. Tomorrow’s parliamentary election will not only shape domestic policy; it may decide whether Moldova continues toward the European Union or slides back into Moscow’s orbit.

“This is about the future of our country,” President Maia Sandu told me in a short video call. Her voice, measured but intense, cut through the static of international speculation. “They want to buy our future. They want to buy our people. This is dirty money, illegal financing, and a campaign of lies.”

Why the Stakes Feel So High

Moldova is small in population but large in geopolitical importance. Straddling the Black Sea corridor and sharing a border with Ukraine, the republic sits on a fault line of European security. Since applying for EU membership in March 2022 and gaining candidate status by June, Moldova has signalled a deliberate pivot west. Accession negotiations began at the end of 2023—a rapid integration trajectory for a country that only cast off Soviet rule in 1991.

Yet domestic life is less about diplomacy and more about practical worries: low wages, soaring energy costs, and the memory of systemic corruption that has hollowed public trust. A million Moldovans live abroad—many of them voters—and their remittances keep families afloat. Which way those votes lean may prove decisive.

Two Blocs, One Tight Race

Polls show the incumbent pro-EU Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS), founded by Sandu, and the Patriotic Bloc, a coalition of left-leaning, pro-Russian parties, locked in a near tie—each hovering around 25%. With 101 seats in parliament, neither side looks likely to win an outright majority. Coalitions are all but certain.

“This is not just another election,” Prime Minister Dorin Recean told reporters recently, casting the contest as a siege. “This is a matter of sovereignty.” The government has accused external actors of pouring money into campaigns and of orchestrating disinformation to sway public opinion; Moscow has dismissed such claims and accused the EU and NATO of hostile intent.

Money, Lies, and the Machinery of Influence

The narrative that has dominated headlines is painfully simple: cash and noise. Last winter’s presidential contest and a companion referendum were shadowed by allegations of widespread vote buying and disinformation. Moldovan officials estimated that more than €100 million flowed into attempts to buy influence. This time, the drumbeat has been louder.

Investigative teams—both local and international—have filmed networks promising money for social media posts, false polls, and anti-government propaganda. Police report that large sums of cash have been smuggled into the country, and they have conducted raids this week on over 100 people allegedly preparing to stage mass disturbances. One of the Patriotic Bloc’s four parties was barred from fielding candidates after accusations of voter bribery.

“They’ve weaponised poverty,” said Andrei Lutenco, director of the Centre for Policy and Reform in Chisinau. “Disinformation is aimed at economic grievances—blame energy bills on the West, blame inflation on sanctions. It’s a toxic mix that can poison a campaign very quickly.”

The Shor Factor

No account of this moment is complete without Ilan Shor, the exiled oligarch. Convicted in 2023 over a major banking fraud and sentenced to 15 years, Shor fled to Russia and has been linked by investigators to covert funding channels. He has been sanctioned by both the EU and the United States for attempting to undermine Moldova’s democratic processes. A recent video message attributed to him offered payments of $3,000 a month to people willing to protest against the current government—a vivid example of how money and theatre can be combined to destabilise.

Voices from the Market and the Frontlines of Fact

Walk into the central market in Chisinau and you will hear a chorus of concern and defiance. “I’m tired of politics,” said Natalia, a fruit vendor who has been here for two decades. “But I worry who will run things. Money talks loudly here. People take cash because they have to feed children.”

Across from her stall, a 22-year-old university student, Mihai, sighed. “My generation wants Europe. Work, rules, chance to stay without leaving. But fear is strong. Many elders remember Russian TV and stories—those seeds are hard to pull out.”

Experts warn that the battle being fought in Moldova is less about tanks than algorithms. A BBC investigation traced networks of hired posters and paid social media operatives producing fake polls and smear content aimed at discrediting PAS. The Kremlin’s foreign intelligence service has upped the rhetorical ante, issuing statements alleging NATO plans to “intimidate Transnistria”—claims dismissed by independent analysts as baseless but potent in their ability to inflame anxieties.

Transnistria and the Shadow of Troops

The breakaway region of Transnistria, a sliver of territory running along Moldova’s east, hosts a small Russian military presence. Estimates vary; Ukrainian sources have suggested a contingent perhaps as small as 1,500. Still, the symbolism is what matters: the presence of foreign forces on Moldovan soil turns elections into matters of security as well as policy.

International Attention and What Comes Next

International observers are watching closely. The Organization for Security and Co‑operation in Europe (OSCE) has deployed more than 100 observers, including a small delegation from Ireland. “We will be at polling stations, documenting procedures,” said Irish parliamentarian Barry Ward, a member of the observer team. “If we see vote-buying or intimidation, our role is to report—not to intervene.”

An exit poll is expected within hours of the polls closing; by Monday morning we should have a clearer picture. The OSCE will publish preliminary findings on the conduct of the vote the following afternoon. But whatever the immediate outcome, the deeper questions will linger: can institutions withstand sustained information warfare? Can a small, economically fragile democracy resist the gravitational pull of a larger neighbour?

Beyond Moldova: A Global Story

Moldova’s election is not simply local theatre. It is a case study in how money, migration, and media collide in the 21st century. It asks a blunt question that many nations must now answer: how resilient are democratic choices when adversaries can fund, fabricate, and foment at scale?

“Moldovan democracy is fragile,” Sandu warned. “EU membership would put it in a safer place, but we can only get there if our people decide for themselves, not under the pressure of lies and dirty money.”

As you read this, consider the texture of your own civic life. How susceptible are our choices to invisible forces? Who decides what is news, and who pays for it? In Chisinau the answers will begin to reveal themselves at the ballot boxes tomorrow. The rest of the world should be watching—not as distant spectators, but as a community that understands how a small country’s choice can ripple across continents.

Population: ~2.4 million
Parliament seats: 101
Diaspora voters: ~1 million
Estimated funds allegedly used to influence past elections: >€100 million (claimed by Moldovan officials)
OSCE observers deployed: 100+

Madaxweyne Xasan oo ka Qaybgalay Casho Sharaf uu Marti-geliyay trump

By

aden

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September 27, 2025

Sep 27(Jowhar)-Madaxweynaha Jamhuuriyadda Federaalka Soomaaliya, Mudane Xasan Sheekh Maxamuud, ayaa ka qaybgalay casho sharaf heer sare ah oo uu marti-geliyay Madaxweynaha Maraykanka, Mudane Donald Trump, iyo Marwada Koowaad ee Maraykanka, Melania Trump.

Spanish city commemorates Gaelic chieftain Red Hugh O’Donnell

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September 27, 2025

Spanish city honours Gaelic chieftain Red Hugh O'Donnell — The Spanish city of Valladolid came to a standstill as Red Hugh's royal funeral was re-enacted

A Spanish city pauses to remember an Irish rebel: the night Red Hugh came home

On a mild evening in Valladolid, the kind of dusk that softens stone and throws lamps into relief, the city stopped. Shops shuttered a little early, tourists gathered on narrow sidewalks, and entire families stepped out of apartment windows to watch a pageant that braided two histories together—one Gaelic, one Castilian—across four centuries.

A horse-drawn carriage rolled slowly through the medieval lanes, flanked by torch-bearers whose flames licked drystone facades. Men in 16th-century armor clicked spurs on cobbles; friars in brown habits walked with bowed heads; Irish wolfhounds padded solemnly beside soldiers in ceremonial dress. A lone chanter set the tone, then a piper raised Amhrán na bhFiann and sent the anthem weaving through the alleys like wind through wheat.

It was a reenactment that made history feel breathing and immediate: the royal funeral of Red Hugh O’Donnell—Aodh Rua of Tír Chonaill—who died in Spain in 1602 while seeking support against English rule. For many here, it was also an intimate ceremony of gratitude and kinship, evidence that centuries-old alliances can survive on memory and ritual as easily as on treaties.

Who was Red Hugh? A man of stormy times

Red Hugh O’Donnell was not a king in the modern sense, but a Gaelic chieftain whose life read like an epic. Born into the rugged landscapes of Donegal—Tír Chonaill in Irish—he was a central figure in the Nine Years’ War (c. 1594–1603), the largest Gaelic uprising against Elizabethan conquest. Alongside Hugh O’Neill, O’Donnell led a confederacy of Irish lords that nearly halted English expansion in Ireland before the pivotal loss at the Battle of Kinsale in 1601.

After Kinsale, O’Donnell sailed for Spain to plead his case to King Philip III. Spain, embroiled in its own continental conflicts, represented a flicker of hope—an ally bound by Catholic faith and common cause. But illness struck while O’Donnell was on Spanish soil. He died far from the heather and bogs of home. Philip III ordered a royal funeral and, in a gesture that has been celebrated in Valladolid ever since, the chieftain was laid to rest in the city then serving as the Spanish capital.

The night’s procession: spectacle and tenderness

The reenactment—now in its fourth year—unfolded like a living tapestry. Organisers had deliberately mixed solemnity with pageantry: King Philip and Queen Margaret (in period costume), Franciscan friars, mounted cavalry, pipers from Ireland and Spain, and former members of the Irish Defence Forces marched together. A wreath-laying in front of the Chapel of Marvels, the site linked to O’Donnell’s burial, drew a hush; Mayor of Valladolid stepped forward to speak, his voice carried on the chill air.

“We honour not only a man but a bond,” said Mayor Isabel Romero, addressing the crowd. “This city remembers because remembrance enriches us.” Her words were met with applause and a spontaneous chorus of conversations in Spanish and Irish, mixing languages as if they were familiar friends.

“It’s a strange and humbling sight,” said Eddie Crawford, a veteran from Lifford who carried the Irish tricolour that night. “I grew up hearing stories of Red Hugh in Donegal. To march here, wearing my uniform, with the people of Valladolid beside me—it’s more than ceremony. It’s homecoming.”

Local color and human moments

There were small, tender scenes that television cameras rarely catch. An elderly Spanish woman, lace shawl wrapped tight against the evening breeze, dabbed at tears as the Irish anthem rose. A group of schoolchildren, clutching miniature flags, shadowed the procession with wide eyes. Near the Chapel of Marvels, a street vendor selling churros watched solemnly, then placed a single flower at the plaque’s base—an unplanned and genuine offering.

The ties that bind: festivals, plaques, and shared archives

The funeral reenactment is the centerpiece of a three-day Hispano-Irish celebration organized by the Hispano-Irish Association of Valladolid, founded 17 years ago. This festival threads history lectures, film screenings, live music, and academic exchanges into a weekend that aims to make the past useful in the present.

“There is something very powerful about the connection the Spanish feel with the Irish,” said organizer Carlos Burgos. “It carries a sense of brotherhood. People here take pride in being guardians of this story.”

Valladolid, a city of roughly 300,000 inhabitants in Spain’s Castilla y León region, has embraced this guardianship with municipal support. The city is twinned with Lifford in County Donegal, a symbolic pairing that draws attention to migration, exile, and how memory crosses borders. The festival has even funded an archaeological dig in 2020 at the Chapel of the Marvels, searching for traces of O’Donnell’s burial.

The Hispano-Irish Association’s voluntary committee hopes to extend recognition beyond Valladolid. Their next ambition is to place a commemorative plaque at Dublin Castle, where a young Red Hugh was once imprisoned and famously escaped as a teenager—an episode that reads like a legend in local lore.

Archives and echoes: Simancas holds secrets

The delegation of Irish guests also visited Simancas, a nearby town whose castle archives—Archivo General de Simancas—hold a trove of documents from the 16th and 17th centuries. Among the papers are O’Donnell’s last will, reportedly dictated in Irish, and correspondence between Irish exiles and Spanish officials. There are even interrogation notes about James Blake, a Galway merchant suspected of spying for England during that fraught summer.

“These documents are fragile, but they are thunderous,” said Professor Elena Martín, a historian at the University of Valladolid. “They let us hear, imperfectly, the last acts of a man who was not simply an Irish chieftain but an actor on a European stage where empires met.”

Why this matters today

Why should a modern audience care about a 17th-century funeral? Because the story of Red Hugh O’Donnell carries forward themes that still resonate: migration and exile, the search for allies across seas, and the small mercies that communities bestow upon those who have come from elsewhere. In a world where borders are again hotly contested and diasporas are reshaping cities, the Valladolid reenactment is both commemoration and conversation.

“History is not a museum piece,” said Hugo O’Donnell, the 7th Duke of Tetuan and a descendant of the O’Donnell dynasty. “It’s a relationship. Red Hugh was a man of loyalty and conviction—qualities that bind people, nations, and generations.”

As the procession concluded and the last torch guttered, people lingered, unwilling to let the spell break. A young Spaniard asked an Irish marcher in weathered uniform, “Why keep doing this?” The marcher smiled and answered simply: “So we remember where we came from, and why we are still connected.”

So I ask you, reader: what stories does your city carry that belong to others? What rituals of remembrance could bridge divides where politics have failed? In Valladolid, under the gentle Spanish sky, an Irish rebel found a different kind of home—one built from empathy, ceremony, and an enduring sense that history needs witnesses.

Ireland to block Israeli ministers’ entry, Taoiseach announces

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September 27, 2025

Ireland to prevent entry of Israeli ministers - Taoiseach — Micheál Martin highlighted the wars in Ukraine and Gaza

A Small Nation, a Big Moral Line

In a packed United Nations General Assembly, Ireland’s Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, stood and made a decision that felt deliberately personal: to bar members of the Israeli government implicated in what he called the “unfolding disaster in Gaza” from setting foot on Irish soil.

“We will act to prevent those members of the Government of Israel who have been instrumental in fomenting the unfolding disaster in Gaza from entering our country,” Martin declared, his words landing like a deliberate stone in an already turbulent pond.

The statement was more than diplomacy; it was a declaration of conscience. For a nation of just five million people that has often punched above its weight in global fora, this moment marred the traditional comfort of neutral platitudes and entered the harder terrain of moral clarity and consequence.

Gaza: Modern Warfare Against the Defenceless

Martin did not mince words. He described Gaza as the product of the most modern, best-equipped armed forces being used against a trapped and largely defenceless population. He invoked the UN Commission of Inquiry’s findings and underscored the gravity of the word “genocide,” reminding delegates that the International Court of Justice obliges states to “use all means to prevent it.”

“We cannot say we were not aware,” Martin warned—an admonition that asked leaders, and the public, to look beyond diplomatic niceties and into the daily reality of civilians caught in conflict.

UN agencies and relief workers, he said, have been at the frontline of preserving life in Gaza. He singled out UNRWA and praised medics and journalists risking everything to bear witness. “What is happening in Gaza cannot be justified or defended. It is an affront to human dignity and decency,” he said.

For many listening, the images were familiar and unbearable: hospitals struggling to function, children malnourished, schools and mosques damaged, and aid consignments stalled at borders. “Babies starving to death while aid rots at the border,” the Taoiseach said, a line that has haunted international headlines and humanitarian briefings since October 2023.

Voices from the Ground

“You stand by the window and you count the ambulances,” a Gaza-based aid worker told me in a phone call arranged through a colleague. “You keep wondering how many more nights families will sleep without food. We cannot keep doing more with less.”

A Dublin activist, who has organized weekly vigils outside the Department of Foreign Affairs, responded to Martin’s words with a measured hope. “It means the government heard the suffering. Words are not enough, but they are the first step toward meaningful pressure,” she said.

Accountability, Ceasefire, and the Limits of Power

Martin’s speech walked a tightrope. He condemned Hamas for the horrors of 7 October 2023—a “monstrous war crime,” he said—while insisting that no crime, however awful, can justify the wholesale destruction of a people or the use of starvation as a weapon. He also argued that Hamas should have no role in a future Palestinian government, even as he stood firmly with Palestinian civilians.

His platform in New York was not merely rhetorical. He reminded the Assembly that Ireland intervened in South Africa’s case at the ICJ, formally recognized the State of Palestine, and is moving to ban imports from the occupied territories—a concrete legal and trade posture that signals Ireland’s willingness to align policy with principle.

And yet, Martin acknowledged the paradox: small states may speak loudly, but they have limited tools to compel action. “Those providing Israel with the means necessary to prosecute its war must reflect on the implications and the effects on the Palestinian people,” he said, calling on influential nations to use whatever leverage they possess “urgently and to maximum effect.”

Global Patterns: A Wider Fraying

The Taoiseach’s remarks were not confined to Gaza. He sounded alarms about other theatres of human suffering—Ukraine, Sudan, Afghanistan—and warned of a dangerous trend: the erosion of international norms. He described Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a deliberate breach of the UN charter and celebrated the “coalition of the willing”—31 countries that pledged strengthened support for Kyiv.

He spoke of the Taliban’s rollback of women’s rights and of the human catastrophe in Sudan, warning that these are not isolated failures but symptoms of a global backslide toward a world where “might is right.” His final plea was for the United Nations to be reasserted as the place where collective will outmuscles narrow interests: “If the UN falters,” he said, “it is because we as leaders have let it down.”

Protests, Walkouts, and Diplomacy in Motion

The Assembly stage took on a theater of its own last week. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced countries that had recognized Palestinian statehood, and scores of delegates walked out ahead of his speech. Ireland was not in the hall when Netanyahu spoke; the Department of Foreign Affairs confirmed the country was absent for that address.

Such gestures—walkouts, absences, sanctions or travel bans—are themselves a form of speech, albeit a noisy and imperfect one. They tell a story about the limits of diplomacy: sometimes we act within institutions, sometimes we choose to step away in protest.

What Does This Mean for Ordinary People?

For families in Gaza, none of these procedural debates will stop the immediate suffering. For the citizens of Israel, debate over which officials can travel and where will be read through a prism of security and solidarity. For Irish people, it’s a reminder that foreign policy is as much about values as it is about trade.

Since joining the UN in 1955, Ireland has made the organization the cornerstone of its foreign policy.
Ireland plans to run for a seat on the Human Rights Council for 2027–2029—another sign it intends to press the human-rights argument on the global stage.
Support for UNIFIL and continued attention to Northern Ireland’s legacy show an Ireland seeking consistency across a messy international tapestry.

Questions to Sit With

What does it mean for international law when states choose to act unilaterally on moral grounds? Is there a point at which words must become sanctions, legislation, or other coercive tools? And who ultimately bears responsibility when institutions designed to protect people—like the UN—struggle to enforce their own rules?

The Taoiseach’s speech asked more than it answered. It invited reflection on the obligations of small states, the power of conscience in foreign policy, and the human stories that sit behind legal formulations. It also invited a simple, unnerving question: if the world cannot prevent mass suffering where it is plainly visible, where else might we be failing?

In the end, the Irish intervention at the UN was a reminder that morality in international affairs is not abstract. It is lived in streets and hospitals and border crossings. It is stitched into the decisions of leaders who can choose to speak—and to act.

For readers around the world: what would you expect your leaders to do when confronted with the kinds of allegations Ireland raised—legal, ethical, and practical? When does solidarity become obligation? When does speech become action?

Obama: Ignoring Gaza’s dire humanitarian crisis is unacceptable

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September 27, 2025

'Unacceptable' to ignore human crisis in Gaza - Obama — Former US president Barack Obama spoke at a discussion at the 3Arena in Dublin

A Night in Dublin: Obama, the Weight of History, and the Hum of a World Unraveling

There are evenings when a city seems to hold its breath. Dublin did that the night Barack Obama took the stage at the 3Arena, not as a former president looking for applause, but as a man asking tough, uncomfortable questions.

At the heart of his message was a plea that has the force of both moral urgency and political common sense: pounding away at places that are already shattered carries no military logic — and ignoring the human suffering unfolding there is a moral failure.

The scene

The arena was full—7,500 people, the sold-out crowd murmuring like a single organism. You could feel the city in the room: accents from the western seaboard rubbing shoulders with tourists from elsewhere, the crowd’s laughter seeded with weary seriousness. He was introduced by Fintan O’Toole, who steered the conversation with a soft but probing touch. For a few hours, politics became intimate, like a fireside conversation magnified to stadium scale.

Outside, the city council had already made headlines, awarding Obama the Freedom of Dublin days earlier — a ceremony that was not without controversy. A segment of councillors boycotted in protest of the massive US military aid package to Israel that many in Ireland and beyond see as the single largest of its kind: a roughly $38 billion memorandum of understanding agreed mid-decade to run over a decade. Inside the arena, though, the reception was warm. No street protests, no shouting. A lone phone, carelessly left on in the audience, became the only interruption — and the former president pointed it out with a wry smile that loosened the room’s tension.

On Gaza, history, and the architecture of grievance

Obama spoke about Gaza not from the abstract podium of policy analysis but from a place of moral clarity. He described children starving, a human crisis that cannot be folded neatly into military calculus. He argued, gently but firmly, that a starting point for any hope of peace is an honest confronting of the past by both sides.

“You cannot help people listen if you refuse to acknowledge their truths,” he said, summarizing a difficult idea with a storyteller’s economy. It was not a neutral commentary. It was insistence: Israelis carry a history of persecution that led to the profound need for a safe homeland; Palestinians carry the enduring trauma of displacement and occupation. To erase either truth is to give space to dehumanization.

He warned that the politics of simplification — the “us versus them” narratives — are not accidental. They are profitable. They are consolidating. “Sometimes leaders have a vested interest in a perpetual state of grievance,” he observed, “because it keeps them in power.”

A tension in the room

There was an honesty in how he handled the complexity. He rejected Hamas’s brutality and cynicism — noting that tactics which imperil an entire people cannot be excused — while also insisting that the Palestinian anger born of dispossession cannot simply be written off. The effect was to refuse easy moral arithmetic: both sides have committed and suffered, and neither absolves the other.

A woman near me, a teacher from Rathmines who spent years volunteering in refugee relief, whispered, “He’s saying what a lot of people can’t: that pain needs naming.” A young law student added, “It’s rare to hear a politician press both sides so firmly on truth.”

Democracy, norms, and the slow corrosion of trust

The conversation pivoted to democracy — not an abstract ideal but a fragile practice. Obama reminded the audience that no democracy is perfect and that institutions can erode incrementally. He spoke of the danger of politicizing the military and justice systems, and how such erosion is not a distant possibility but already visible in parts of the world.

“When the loyalty of soldiers or prosecutors shifts from country to party, you lose the arbiter that holds a pluralistic society together,” he said. The remark landed like a stone in still water. People nodded. Some looked down, thinking of headlines and court cases that have dominated recent news cycles in multiple countries.

He also pointed to a modern crisis of attention: social media’s business model favors outrage because outrage hooks eyeballs. Add to that a new technological accelerator — artificial intelligence — and you have a turbocharged environment where truth and fabrication can be indistinguishable.

An older man in a tweed cap, who’d worked in Dublin’s docks for forty years, chuckled darkly and said to his companion, “Back in my day it was newspapers you trusted… now it’s anyone who yells loudest.”

Capitalism, nationalism, and the ghosts of the twentieth century

One of the sharper lines from the night likened contemporary nationalisms to a revival of the “blood-and-soil” rhetoric that helped birth the most destructive ideologies of the last century. He reminded the audience that economic systems can be startlingly compatible with authoritarian impulses; profit motives and illiberal politics can find uneasy common cause.

That earned a round of thoughtful applause. Some in the crowd — entrepreneurs, students, retirees — exchanged glances, the kind that suggest recognition rather than agreement. It’s a complicated accusation: to say that markets and authoritarianism can coexist is to force us to confront the responsibilities of citizens and consumers alike.

What do we do next?

Obama avoided grand promises. He did not produce a magic formula to fix social media, end occupation, or restore fraying norms. Instead he asked for something harder: sustained civic engagement. He encouraged consumers to use their choices — pressuring platforms and advertisers, changing habits — and urged people to put down devices and reclaim conversational space.

“Censorship by the state is not the answer,” he warned. “Nor is lethargy.”

Outside the 3Arena, Dublin’s late summer air was crisp. A street vendor selling kebabs and chips reflected on the evening: “It felt like he was trying to get us to imagine being in each other’s shoes—not easy, but we need to start somewhere.”

Places to sit with the weight of a speech

After the applause faded and the lights came up, the conversation kept going on the tram home, in cafés, in the city’s parks. That’s the mark of a good evening of public conversation: it doesn’t tidy the world; it enlarges it.

So I’ll leave you with this: if truth is complicated, if history is messy, and if politics is a fight for stories as much as territory, then what story do you think deserves to be told—and heard—next?

We live in a moment where the small acts of listening and the hard work of naming grievances can be profoundly political. That was the invitation in Dublin: to move beyond easy certainties and to imagine, however imperfectly, a path that keeps human dignity at the center.

Somalia’s Financial Development Receives Boost As Salaam Somali Bank Emerges Game Changer

By

Mahad

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September 27, 2025

In a nation charting a course of sustained economic recovery, one institution stands as both a testament to resilience and a catalyst for growth: Salaam Somali Bank (SSB). From its headquarters in Mogadishu, Somalia’s oldest financial-

Russia calls Zelensky’s threat to attack the Kremlin ‘irresponsible’ and provocative

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September 27, 2025

Russia: Zelensky 'threat' to hit Kremlin 'irresponsible' — In an interview with US media outlet Axios, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian officials 'have to know where their bomb shelters are'

The Kremlin’s Shelters and Ukraine’s Resolve: A War Told in Missives and Mud

It began with a line that felt designed to puncture both decorum and complacency: “They have to know where their bomb shelters are.” Those were the words President Volodymyr Zelensky offered in a recent interview, a blistering mixture of taunt and threat aimed squarely at Russia’s leadership if Moscow does not halt its offensive.

The remark ricocheted across diplomatic corridors and news feeds, landing hardest in Moscow, where the Kremlin called it “irresponsible.” Dmitry Peskov, the president’s spokesman, dismissed the comment as evidence of “desperate efforts” and warned of the dangers of escalating rhetoric. “He’s issuing threats left and right,” Peskov told reporters, his voice threaded with the kind of indignation that sounds rehearsed on repeat.

But rhetoric here is not mere noise. It’s a thermometer. It measures how heated the contest for advantage has become, how much risk leaders are willing to accept, and — crucially — how civilians feel the tremors of a war that has endured for years and refuses to be contained to neat headlines.

On the ground: from Kharkiv to Donetsk

Outside Kyiv’s stolid government complexes and the Kremlin’s ancient walls, the war’s contours are less philosophical and more visceral. This year’s biggest aerial barrage struck government buildings in Kyiv, and cities across Ukraine — Kharkiv among them — have been pounded in waves. Rescue workers move through rubble, their faces mapped by exhaustion and a stubborn, necessary calm.

“When the sirens start, the neighborhood becomes another city,” said Olena, a volunteer medic in Kharkiv, her voice steady though her hands trembled as she spoke of nights spent sorting shrapnel from lifesaving supplies. “You learn to carry a torch that lasts longer than your fear.”

Military voices offer a complementary view. General Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukraine’s land forces, told reporters that Russia’s 2025 spring and summer offensives “have effectively been disrupted,” noting that despite stepped-up Russian artillery fire — roughly double Ukraine’s rate, he said — the expected breakthroughs never materialized.

There are, however, painful caveats. Russia continues to make incremental advances across several stretches of the front line. Syrskyi described a tactic he calls “a thousand cuts”: dozens of tiny infantry assaults designed to nibble away at defenses and sap morale. These are not headline-making thrusts; they are grinding, attritional, and human-costly.

Numbers that shape the horizon

To make sense of the battlefield, numbers matter. Here are the figures that officials and analysts keep returning to:

Active front line: approximately 1,250 km.
Estimated Russian personnel engaged in the fighting: around 712,000.
Portion of Donetsk currently under Russian control: over 70%.
Western intelligence estimates of the total killed and wounded: in excess of one million combined on both sides (figures are imprecise and contested).

Each number is a map of suffering: hectares of ruined fields, families split between basements and border crossings, hospitals that operate like islands of light.

Energy, Escalation, and a Shifting Western Script

Beyond the trenches, the fight is also about power — literally. Ukrainian forces have lately focused on Russian energy infrastructure, repeatedly striking refineries, depots, and military-industrial sites. Such strikes are intended to erode the logistical backbone of Russian operations, but they also raise the specter of broader regional fallout.

Washington and European capitals have long balanced on a treacherous needle: how to support Ukraine’s capacity to strike deep inside Russia without provoking a wider war. That hesitation has sometimes created the sense that Kyiv’s diplomatic hand is constrained. Yet, Zelensky has argued that he has the go-ahead from the United States to continue targeting military infrastructure, a claim that reverberated in capitals.

The broader strategic conversation acquired a dangerous subplot when Bloomberg reported that European envoys — from Britain, France, and Germany — had privately told Moscow that NATO might be prepared to shoot down any Russian aircraft violating European airspace. Moscow’s reaction was swift and furious, with Peskov calling the notion “very irresponsible.”

Last week NATO said that Russian jets had violated Estonian airspace, an incident that highlights how quickly an airspace breach could escalate into confrontation between nuclear-armed blocs.

Voices from the middle: locals, analysts, and soldiers

“Nobody wanted to be the first to admit how tired we were,” said Mykola, another Kharkiv resident who runs a small bakery that now supplies volunteer brigades. “But the war doesn’t give you permission to stop. You wake up. You bake bread. You carry sandbags.”

For military analysts, the war has evolved into a contest of endurance and adaptation. “The modern battlefield is as much about logistics, drones, and precision strikes as it is about manpower,” said Dr. Hannah Köhler, a defense analyst based in Berlin. “If one side can maintain supply chains and protect critical nodes, it outlasts the other. That’s why energy sites become strategic targets and why the West’s role — in supplying precision munitions and intelligence — is so consequential.”

Yet the civilian calculus remains heartbreaking and simple. “We trade access to the sun for access to the subway,” joked a teacher from Donetsk, her words laced with gallows humor. “If negotiations bring peace, I’ll gladly stop hating satellite dishes.”

What does this mean for the world?

If you step back, the contest in Ukraine is not solely a regional clash. It tests international norms, the limits of deterrence, and the resilience of alliances. It raises urgent questions: How much risk should democratic countries accept to deter aggression? How do you balance support with the danger of escalation? When does rhetoric become a provocation?

And there is a more human question: How do people rebuild lives when the map of safety shifts with each artillery salvo?

For now, front-line reports, presidential jabs, and strategic warnings will continue to trade places across the headlines. The truth is harsher and more intimate: whether in Kyiv’s government quarter, a Kharkiv bakery, or a frontline dugout, daily survival is being negotiated in fragments — one shelter, one loaf, one supply delivery at a time.

“We don’t have the luxury of waiting for history to decide who’s right,” said a volunteer coordinator in Lviv. “We have to make choices now — about shelter, about solidarity, about what we are willing to risk for the future.”

What are we, as a global community, willing to risk to uphold rules we say we believe in? And at what point do the costs of caution become the costs of abandonment?

These are the questions that linger not in press briefings but at kitchen tables and in cellars where people count the hours between sirens. As leaders exchange warnings over microphones, ordinary lives continue to be the ledger upon which the real cost of this conflict is written.

ciidan ka tirsan Daraawiishta Puntland oo si sharci darro ah Khamriga u galiya Garoowe

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aden

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September 27, 2025

Sep 27(Jowhar)-Taliye ku xigeenka Qeybta Booliska Gobolka Nugaal, Gaashaanle Dhexe Maxamuud Muuse Bile (Fardafuul), ayaa shaaca ka qaaday in khamriga si sharci-darro ah lagu soo geliyo magaalada Garoowe, islamarkaana arrintaas ay ku lug leeyihiin ciidamo ka tirsan Puntland.

Saddex Qof oo isku Qoys ah oo lagu Af-duubtay Galgaduud

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aden

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September 27, 2025

Sep 27(Jowhar)-Wararka naga soo gaaraya gobolka Galgaduud ayaa sheegaya in maleeshiyaad hubeysan ay deegaanka Laan-dawaco, oo u dhaxeeya magaalooyinka Cadaado iyo Dhabad, ka af-duubteen saddex ruux oo qoys ah.