Nov 22(Jowhar)-Wasiirka Arrimaha Dibedda iyo Iskaashiga Caalamiga ah, Mudane Abdisalam Abdi Ali, ayaa maanta kulan la qaatay Ra’iisul Wasaare Ku Xigeenka ahna Wasiirka Arrimaha Dibedda Jamhuuriyadda Islaamiga ah ee Pakistan, Senator Mohammad Ishaq Dar, inta uu socdey shirka 4aad ee Madasha Wasiirrada EU Indo-Pacific ee magaalada Brussels.
What’s Included in Donald Trump’s 28-Point Plan for Ukraine?
Paper Peace, Real Lives: Inside the Controversial 28-Point Plan That Could Redraw Ukraine
On a late spring morning that felt ordinary in Kyiv — vendors selling hot varenyky on a street corner, children in bright backpacks weaving between trams — the world quietly received a document that could upend everything people here have fought to protect.
The 28-point framework, circulated in draft form and reportedly backed by former US President Donald Trump, reads like a legal roadmap and a geopolitical Rorschach test at once. It promises reconstruction funds, diplomatic thawing with Moscow and a ceasefire enforced by an American-led “Peace Council.” It also requires Ukraine to codify limits on its own sovereignty — constitutional language forbidding NATO membership, lines on maps that leave Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk effectively under Russian control, and freezes on contested territories such as Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.
The contours of the offer
At its core the plan is transactional: security guarantees for Kyiv in exchange for territorial accommodation. It proposes a comprehensive non-aggression pact between Russia, Ukraine and European states, mediated talks between NATO and Moscow, and an American-Russian working group to police compliance.
There are also promises of money. The draft suggests deploying $100 billion of frozen Russian assets into a US-led reconstruction effort in Ukraine, with the United States taking half the profits; European partners are asked to add another $100 billion. It proposes reintegrating Russia into global institutions — rejoining the G8 and lifting sanctions contingent on compliance.
And there are details that strike at the daily lives of Ukrainians: obligations to keep the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant under IAEA supervision with power shared between the two countries, a commitment to discharge prisoners and reunite families, and a 100-day clock to elections in Kyiv.
What this would mean on the ground
“It sounds like a tidy contract on a laptop,” said Olena, 42, a schoolteacher in a suburb of Dnipro whose brother returned home last year after being wounded. “But you can’t trade a city for a promise.” Her voice tightened. “People live in these places. They loved them. They planted trees there. You can’t simply write them off.”
For millions of Ukrainians, the war has been a catalogue of dislocations. UN agencies estimate that well over 8 million people fled the country since 2022 while several million more remain internally displaced. Cities have been shredded in places; WHO and humanitarian groups report thousands of civilian deaths, with infrastructure and industry damaged on a scale that development institutions have warned will cost hundreds of billions to restore.
Imagine, then, a line on a map where whole neighborhoods, schools and hospitals fall on one side or another. For families in towns like Beryslav or parts of Kherson, the proposal to “freeze” front lines is a reminder that frozen conflicts seldom stay frozen for long.
Money, reconstruction and the heavy ledger
“Rebuilding Ukraine will require sustained international finance and technical support,” said Dr. Amal Hassan, a reconstruction economist who has worked with the World Bank on post-conflict planning. “Estimates vary, but comprehensive recovery will run into the low hundreds of billions, and not all of that can be shouldered by one nation.”
The draft’s notion of using $100 billion in frozen Russian assets feels at once tempting and legally thorny. Western countries froze hundreds of billions in Russian reserves and private assets in the early phase of the war; converting those holdings to finance reconstruction would involve delicate legal pathways, claims by victims, and questions about precedent. The plan’s stipulation that the US would receive 50% of profits from such investment will raise eyebrows in capitals already wary of perceived inequity.
Red lines, nuclear risk, and NATO’s shadow
Arguably the most combustible elements are the security provisions: Ukraine would be required to constitutionally renounce NATO membership and limit its armed forces — a cap cited in the draft at 600,000 personnel. NATO would agree not to station troops on Ukrainian soil, and European fighter jets would be redistributed to neighboring Poland.
“Security guarantees on paper are only as credible as the institutions that enforce them,” said Marin Petrovic, a former NATO staffer now at a Brussels think-tank. “If enforcement comes from a council chaired by a party with inconsistent relations with Russia, you have to ask whether guarantees would withstand pressure.”
The plan also touches a nerve with the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe, proposing IAEA-supervised operation and a division of its electricity. The plant has been at the center of international safety concerns since 2022; any arrangement that ties energy to political concessions will be scrutinized by nuclear experts and international monitors.
Voices from Kyiv, Kherson and beyond
“I want peace,” said Ivan, a market vendor outside Kyiv who remembers blackouts and air raids. “But peace that comes from letting someone take my town? That’s not peace.”
From Moscow, the narrative is different. An unnamed Kremlin adviser told a Russian outlet that diplomatic reintegration would be a “necessary step to stabilise European security,” reflecting a view that sanctions are a lever for negotiations rather than permanent punishment.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has signalled willingness to discuss proposals, saying he would consider any plan that guarantees his people’s safety and sovereignty — though he has also repeatedly said that no decisions that “compromise the nation” will be taken without broad public consent. “We do not bargain with the land our ancestors bled for,” a senior Ukrainian official told me on condition of anonymity.
Why the world should care
This is not just a regional contest over borders and oil. It is a test of how the international system balances principles — territorial integrity, the norm against conquest — against the pragmatic need to halt violence. The draft taps into broader currents: great-power realignment, debates over the utility of sanctions, and rising concerns about nuclear safety in conflict zones.
Ask yourself: would you accept stability if it required accepting the loss of another people’s homeland? What price do we place on a ceasefire? On justice? These are not abstract queries. They are the decisions that will shape reconstruction budgets, refugee returns, and whether Europe’s security architecture will hold or be refashioned.
Questions left in the draft’s wake
Who decides the lines on the map? Who is held accountable for violations? How do you balance resettlement rights, property claims, and the legal and moral imperative to seek accountability for war crimes amid an amnesty clause? The draft answers some of these with firm language — and leaves others open to interpretation.
The document on the table is a beginning, perhaps; a tantalizing chance to stop the guns, perhaps; a surrender disguised as diplomacy, perhaps. It depends, as with all treaties, on who signs it, how it is enforced, and the lived realities of the people whose lives it would reconfigure.
In the end, the people in the markets, the hospitals, the shattered suburbs will bear the consequences. As debates ricochet through capitals and committee rooms, remember: peace negotiated without the voices of the vulnerable is unlikely to last. Whose voices will be heard when the ink dries?
Wild bear attacks schoolchildren in Canada, leaving 11 students injured
When the forest stepped into the classroom: a grizzly attack that rattled a remote valley
There are places where the forest feels like an extension of the town: trails that thread behind schoolyards, salmon runs that mark seasons, elders who still read the weather off the tide. Bella Coola, a narrow inlet tucked into the coastal spine of British Columbia, is one of those places. It is beautiful enough to hush you into paying attention — and wild enough to remind you, sometimes brutally, of an old truth: on this land, humans are guests.
Yesterday afternoon, that old truth arrived in a way no one who lives in that valley will soon forget.
A day trip turned emergency
Eleven people were injured when a grizzly bear charged a school group on a well-known route locals call the “Old Trail”, regional Royal Canadian Mounted Police officials reported. The injured ranged from children as young as nine to adults; two were described as critically injured and two more as seriously hurt. The remaining seven did not require hospital admission, according to the British Columbia Emergency Health Service.
“Several people were injured by the bear. Injuries are described as serious,” an RCMP spokesperson said. Beyond the numbers, the scene that followed looked, by all accounts, like something from a nightmare stitched into an ordinary afternoon: backpacks strewn across moss, small handprints stained with blood, a community in shock.
“He ran so close to my son,” said a local mother, who asked that her full name not be used. “He said the bear was going after somebody else. I can’t stop replaying the sound of him telling me that.”
How a valley that teaches respect met a sudden threat
Bella Coola is the traditional territory of the Nuxalk Nation, a community whose relationship with the land stretches back generations. The Nuxalk administrative office confirmed the incident affected local residents and that Acwsalcta school—where many children of the community attend—remained closed the following day.
“This is our home. We go out on these trails with our children because we want them to know the river, the forest, the berry patches,” said an elder from the Nuxalk Nation. “But yesterday the forest answered back in a way we did not expect.”
Local lives here are threaded with practical rituals: tying food in bear-resistant containers before long hikes, teaching kids to make noise on trails, timing berry-picking to avoid dawn and dusk. Those rituals are not born of paranoia but of respect, of a hard-earned humility about the animals that share this land.
What we know — and what we don’t
At the time of reporting, the bear had not been confirmed as apprehended and the BC Conservation Officer Service had taken over the investigation. Authorities urged residents to stay indoors while search efforts and assessments continued. The Nuxalk Nation posted warnings on community channels about an “aggressive bear in the area.”
Questions multiply in the space between the facts: Was the bear defending a food source or cubs? Was the group making typical school outing noise or was there an unusual provocation? Officials have said they do not yet have enough information to say what prompted the attack.
Wildlife biologists emphasize that motivations are rarely simple. “Grizzly behavior can change with seasons, food shortages, and increasing human presence on their foraging grounds,” explained a regional wildlife scientist who asked not to be named. “A bear that’s otherwise shy can become bold when it’s hungry or stressed.”
Numbers that put the incident in context
Grizzly attacks in Canada are statistically rare but devastating when they occur. British Columbia holds one of the largest concentrations of grizzlies in the country, especially along the coast where salmon and lush vegetation provide rich food webs. While annual attack numbers vary, experts note that serious encounters have trended upward in areas where human access to wild spaces has increased.
That increase is not just a local anecdote. Across North America, expanding human recreation in remote areas, habitat loss, and shifting food patterns associated with climate change are altering the rhythms of wildlife. Those shifts mean more unpredictable crossings of human and animal paths.
The human ripple effects
After the attack, the valley’s usual soundtrack changed. The ferry boat’s horn across the inlet sounded higher and lonelier. Schoolchildren who the day before had been practicing for a winter play now walked home with adults, checking behind them as if the trees might answer. Local restaurants saw fewer patrons; trails that were popular with hikers and Indigenous families alike sat quiet.
“We teach our kids the names of the berries, the stars, the rivers,” said a teacher who volunteered at the school. “But we didn’t have a lesson for this. How do you teach a child why the world is both beautiful and terrifying?”
The delicate thread connecting safety, education, and cultural practice is now frayed. The immediate concern is medical and logistical: the injured need care, families need information, and the community needs to know whether the threat remains. The longer conversation — about coexistence, resource management, and who decides land use — is already under way.
What safety looks like from here
If there is an argument to be made for practical steps, it is one grounded in respect and local knowledge. Experts suggest a few measures that communities and visitors can embrace to reduce the likelihood of encounters turning violent:
- Make noise on trails and travel in groups when possible; bears usually avoid humans if warned early.
- Store food and scented items in bear-resistant containers or hang them away from campsites.
- Be trained in first aid and have a clear emergency plan for remote outings.
- Work with Indigenous knowledge holders and local conservation officers to identify high-risk areas and times.
“Prevention is a partnership,” said a conservation officer in a phone interview. “We can’t do it alone. Communities know their land best. Officials can offer resources, but listening to local practice is vital.”
Wider questions: who pays for living in a landscape that wants to be wild?
Reading the headlines, you might ask: why are children on a trail so close to large predators? The answer is layered. For many communities in British Columbia—especially Indigenous ones—outdoor education is cultural education. It is how children learn food sovereignty, language of place, and the rhythms of salmon runs and berry seasons. To retreat wholly indoors is to lose an irreplaceable form of learning.
Yet the choices we make about access, infrastructure, and land management shape risk. Are trails designed with wildlife corridors in mind? Are resources available to teach safe practices? Who funds bear-proof bins and local conservation officers? The attack in Bella Coola forces those logistical and ethical questions into the open.
What to hold in mind
Bear attacks are profoundly traumatic for communities. They leave scars that last beyond the physical injuries: a parent who refuses to let a child walk alone, an elder who avoids a favorite berry patch, a teacher whose classroom feels colder. But they also reveal something else—resilience. Within hours of the incident, neighbors were checking on one another, volunteers were organizing supplies, and local leaders were coordinating with authorities.
“We will learn from this,” said an elder quietly, as the sun slid behind the mountains. “We will change how we teach our children, yes. But we will also keep teaching them the land. We cannot live without it.”
As the investigation continues and the valley waits for the bear to be located or to move on, Bella Coola’s story presses a question to all of us: how can we honor wildness without inviting harm? How do we teach our children to love the land and still keep them safe? These are not easy questions. They are, however, questions worth sitting with—out loud, in community, and with the humility the forest demands.
Peace proposal: Surrender to Moscow or start of a negotiation process?
A Deal or a Betrayal? Inside the Secret 28-Point Blueprint That Has Europe Holding Its Breath
Imagine wandering through Kyiv at dusk: the glow of streetlamps, the smell of frying onions from a corner kiosk, shell-pocked facades stitched with fresh plaster. Now imagine the tremor of a single headline rolling through those streets — a privately drafted peace plan that would recognize the very territories Ukrainians have bled to defend. For many here, it didn’t read like diplomacy. It read like surrender.
That was the scene this week, as a document quietly circulated in diplomatic backchannels — a 28-point blueprint, reportedly crafted with U.S. involvement and closely discussed with Moscow — that proposes to freeze, formalize and in some cases legalize Russia’s wartime gains. The revelation landed like a cold slap in Brussels and Kyiv, and sent shivers through towns along the front line where people have learned the vocabulary of loss and endurance.
What the Draft Would Change — In Plain Language
At its core, the reported framework would do several seismic things: formally accept Crimea — annexed by Russia in 2014 — as part of Russia’s sphere; recognize the Russian-held regions of Donetsk and Luhansk; freeze lines in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia; cap Ukrainian armed forces at roughly 600,000 personnel; bar Ukraine from ever joining NATO; and prohibit Kiev from pursuing war reparations or international prosecutions against Russia.
In return, the document sketched out a decade-long U.S. security guarantee of unspecified shape — largely intelligence, logistics and “appropriate” measures following consultation with allies rather than an automatic military response — and very public incentives for Moscow: a route back into international institutions, staged lifting of sanctions, and cooperation on commercially lucrative projects from Arctic rare-earth mining to joint data centres.
Pieces that Make People Uneasy
There were other, quieter proposals that carry cultural weight: Russian elevated to official status inside Ukraine, and greater formal recognition of the local branch of the Russian Orthodox Church. For a nation whose very identity has been contested along language and faith lines for decades, these are not administrative footnotes; they are identity politics writ large.
Voices on the Ground: Fear, Fury, and Practical Worries
“It feels like we’re being asked to barter our children’s future,” said Olena, 37, who runs a small bakery near the Dnipro river. “My husband fought last year. We live on the edge of the fortress belt — those trenches and towns you read about. Are we supposed to just hand them over and hope for the best?”
In Kharkiv, a teacher named Anatoly who lost family belongings in a 2022 strike, frowned over tea and said, “Peace that begins with giving my home away isn’t peace. It’s an amputation.”
Brussels sounded the alarm. “Any settlement must be acceptable to Ukraine and to Europe,” said one EU foreign policy official speaking on condition of anonymity. “Rewarding aggression — that’s the peril here. It’s not merely geopolitics; it’s precedent.”
Security Analysts and What the Plan Would Mean in Hard Numbers
Security experts caution that the military changes would be profound. Ukraine’s armed forces — estimated at around one million soldiers, including mobilized reserves in recent years — would be reduced dramatically under the proposal. Neutralizing long-range strike capabilities and limiting troop strength would not only alter deterrence but also reshape the balance of power across eastern Europe.
Natia Seskuria, a military analyst, explained it simply: “If Ukraine surrenders the so-called ‘Fortress Belt’ — fortified towns and defensive lines painstakingly constructed over the last decade — it loses not just territory, but the ability to project defense effectively into the open terrain west of the line. That’s not just a military setback; it’s a long-term strategic vulnerability.”
And the human price is already vast: the war since February 2022 has displaced millions and caused tens of thousands of deaths — civilians and soldiers alike. Asking those communities to accept a deal that cements occupation would be akin to asking survivors to forgive a crime before justice has been served.
Money on the Table: Who Wins, Who Loses?
One of the plan’s more controversial elements involved frozen Russian sovereign assets. Reportedly, some $100 billion in immobilized funds would be directed toward Ukraine’s reconstruction — but with half of the returns allegedly channelled into U.S.-led investment projects that would also carry Russian participation.
“It’s extraordinary,” said a financial adviser who follows sanctions regimes. “You’re talking about turning assets seized in response to aggression into a revenue stream that partly benefits the aggressor. That strikes people across Europe as morally and politically fraught.”
For Eastern Europeans who remember the raw geopolitics of the 1990s, the optics are terrible: rebuilding financed in part by frozen assets, but administered in a way that gives Russia a financial stake in future cooperation. Critics call it a perverse incentive — a reward for bad-faith behavior.
Transatlantic Tension: A New Test for Old Alliances
Perhaps the most destabilizing element is the signal the plan sends about U.S. policy. Across European capitals, there is a growing sense that Washington’s commitment — once the axis around which European security revolved — might be shifting from hard military backing to managed, transactional guarantees.
“This isn’t just a negotiation over land,” said a former NATO official. “It’s a test of whether the transatlantic relationship can still be relied upon to uphold the rules that have kept Europe relatively stable for decades.”
That anxiety is compounded by the proposed ten-year guarantee, which on paper sounds comforting but is ambiguous in practice. If the U.S. promises intelligence support rather than forceful military intervention, what stops Russia from probing limits again in year seven?
What Comes Next? Options and Uncertainties
Ukrainian leaders have pushed back, publicly and privately, while European capitals scramble to craft counter-offers that keep Ukraine whole and safe without rewarding aggression. Alternative frameworks are reportedly under discussion that would anchor any ceasefire to current contact lines rather than pre-emptive land cessions.
But the clock is political: rumors of an expedited timeline, public calls to sign by a symbolic holiday, and reports of threatened cuts to arms deliveries and intelligence support have only increased the pressure on Kyiv.
“We can trade rhetoric,” reflected Gabrielius Landsbergis, Lithuania’s former foreign minister, in a social-media post that resonated across the Baltic capitals: “Or we can finally step up and pay the price to defend the values and security that belong to Europe.”
Questions for the Reader
Where do you stand when peace comes at the cost of justice? Would you prefer a ceasefire that freezes lives in a frozen injustice, or continued struggle with the hope of future restoration? These are not hypothetical abstractions for people in Ukraine — they are choices with lifetimes attached.
As diplomats trade drafts in dimly lit rooms and towns along the front line brace for winter, the world watches. The stakes are not only territorial. They are moral, strategic, and generational. And the answer will shape the map — and the norms — for years to come.
Trump hails productive exchange after meeting with Mamdani
When the Oval Office Meets City Hall: An Unlikely Handshake Over the Future of New York
There are moments in politics that feel like a photograph: two faces, two histories, stacked against the backdrop of a place that matters to millions. One such image unfolded recently in the Oval Office — a meeting between US President Donald Trump and New York City’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani. On paper, it was an odd pairing: a 79-year-old former New Yorker who has made the city both a springboard and a punching bag, and a 34-year-old democratic socialist, Uganda-born, the son of immigrants, and a newcomer to national politics. In practice, it was a collision of narratives about who New York is and who it should become.
“We’ve just had a great… very productive meeting,” the president said afterward, in his unmistakable cadence. “We have one thing in common. We want this city of ours that we love to do very well.” Whether that sentence signals camaraderie or calculation depends on where you stand on the city’s political map.
A Mayor-Elect Who Sings a Different Tune
Zohran Mamdani’s rise was swift and, to many, surprising. He will be sworn in on 1 January as the first Muslim and first South Asian mayor of a city that is home to Wall Street and to a million stories. At 34, he ran a campaign that leaned into social media savvy, grassroots organization, and an unvarnished focus on affordability: housing, groceries, childcare, transit fares. New Yorkers, after decades of watching their paychecks stretch thinner against rising costs, voted for a candidate who spoke plainly about the calculation that keeps people up at night.
“We’re worried about putting dinner on the table,” said Sofia Alvarez, who has run a small bodega in Jackson Heights for 18 years. “My niece lives with three roommates and still can’t afford rent. I’m hopeful someone who grew up with this city will actually fix it, not just talk about it.”
If New Yorkers are stretched — the city’s population hovers around 8.5 million residents — they are also staggeringly diverse. Roughly four in ten residents were born abroad, and those immigrant neighborhoods are the arteries of the city’s economy and culture. They’re also the frontline in debates about sanctuary policies and federal enforcement, a point of friction between the mayor-elect’s platform and the president’s hardline rhetoric.
Old Grudges, New Prelude
The lead-up to this meeting was a string of barbs. Mr. Trump has called Mr. Mamdani names — “radical left lunatic,” “communist,” and worse — and has threatened to withhold federal funds from the nation’s largest city. Mr. Mamdani countered in election rallies, urging activists to “turn the volume up,” and promising he would speak out when federal policies harm New Yorkers.
And yet, on the day they met in Washington, the tenor shifted. “The better he does, the happier I am,” Mr. Trump said, adding that he expected to “get along fine” with the mayor-elect. Mamdani, for his part, posed for a grinning selfie on a plane bound for the capital and told reporters he would work with any agenda that benefits his constituents — but would not hesitate to oppose what he sees as harmful policy.
How Much Power Does the President Have?
The exchange raises a thorny question: how far can the federal executive go in withdrawing funds from a city? New York City is slated to receive roughly $7.4 billion from the federal government in fiscal year 2026, about 6.4% of the city’s total spending, according to a report from the New York State Comptroller. Much of that money is mandated by Congress for specific programs. Legal scholars warn that using the purse strings as political leverage against a city’s elected leaders is fraught and would invite litigation.
“There are legal guardrails,” said Dr. Maya Kapoor, an urban policy expert at Columbia University. “The president can direct executive departments, but outright rescinding funds appropriated by Congress would trigger constitutional review. Politically, it also has a cost — cities like New York power the national economy. If services are disrupted, the economic fallout would be widely felt.”
On the Ground: Daily Life, Rising Costs, and the Politics of Practicality
To understand what’s at stake, you have to walk the city. Take the No. 7 train in Queens on an early Tuesday morning: a sea of grocery bags, strollers, and weary students. Or the Upper West Side where a rent-stabilized apartment can still cost close to twice the national average. New Yorkers speak not in abstractions but in dollars and minutes.
“I pay almost double what my cousin pays in Ohio for the same two-bedroom,” said Tyler Ramos, a public-school teacher in the Bronx. “Inflation is not just a number — it’s real. People are making impossible choices.”
And numbers back that up. A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found just 26% of Americans thought President Trump was doing a good job managing the cost of living — a figure that stacks onto the political pressure the city and national leaders face. Inflation, housing shortages, and a frayed transit system that affects millions daily make the mayoral office less a ceremonial perch and more a frontline command post.
Bridging Polarization: Is Compromise Possible?
There’s an almost cinematic contrast here: a president who built his brand on combative celebrity and a mayor-elect whose appeal came from grassroots zeal. Yet both claim the same objective — a stronger New York. That single sentence — “we want this city to do very well” — suggests a rare overlap in political purpose, even if the means are fiercely disputed.
So how do you govern a city that is the country’s ledger and its conscience? It requires navigation across jurisdictional lines, from the neighborhood block association to federal agencies. It demands a kind of messy diplomacy rarely taught in political science classes: the art of bargaining for buses and bonding for bridges while holding an electorate together.
“If you’re a mayor, you become a professional compromiser,” said Lena Park, a community organizer in Sunset Park. “You have to listen to Dona Rosa across the street and to the transit union down the block. You can’t be ideological forever. People need heat in winter and job training in spring.”
What This Meeting Means Globally
New York is not just America’s most populous city — it is a global node. Decisions made here ripple outwards: for markets, for immigration policy, for international investors watching how a major metropolis handles affordability and public safety. A civil meeting between two political adversaries may seem small, but it can set the tone for cooperation in crises — natural disasters, economic shocks, or public health threats — that transcend municipal borders.
Ask yourself: do we prefer our leaders to posture or to produce? When the immediate headlines fade, citizens will measure success by whether the subways run reliably, whether a child’s family can find an affordable apartment, whether neighborhoods feel safe without becoming militarized. Those are the things that define the health of a city, and by extension, the country’s resilience.
What Comes Next?
The next months will be a test. Will rhetoric give way to working-level arrangements? Will threats to federal funding materialize into legal skirmishes, or will both sides find pragmatic accommodations? For residents of New York, the answers are urgent; for observers worldwide, they’re a lesson in how democratic governments manage friction without fragmenting.
“I don’t want to see us locked in a permanent fight,” Mamdani told reporters. “I will collaborate where it helps New Yorkers, and I will stand up where it doesn’t.”
That’s as close to a road map as anyone has right now: a promise of partnership, a pledge of pushback, and the slow, inevitable work of running a city where millions share the same streets but lead dramatically different lives. Will that be enough? Only time — and turnout, policy, and hard negotiations over the little things that matter most to ordinary people — will tell.
What do you think a city like New York needs from its leaders? Tell me — and let’s keep watching how this unlikely handshake shapes the city and perhaps, in time, the nation.
Madaxweyne Xasan oo ka qeyb galay xuska maalinta Macalinka Soomaaliyeed
Nov 22(Jowhar)-Magaalada Muqdisho ayaa maanta si weyn looga xusay Maalinta Macalinka Soomaaliyeed, iyadoo munaasabadda weyn ay ka Socoto Garoonka Cayaaraha Muqdisho, halkaas oo ay isugu tageen boqolaal arday oo ka kala socday iskuullo dalka ka jira.
Ilhan Omar oo si kulul uga jawaabtay go’aanka Soomaalida ka dhanka ah ee Trump
Nov 22(Jowhar)-Xildhibaanadda Congress-ka Maraykanka, Ilhan Omar, ayaa si adag uga jawaabtay hadalka Madaxweynaha Maraykanka ee ku saabsanaa joojinta barnaamijka TPS ee ilaalinayay Soomaalida Minisotta.
Trump presses Ukraine to accept plan before looming deadline
An Oval Office Deadline: A Peace Proposal That Demands Territory
There was a hush in the Oval Office the day the deadline was set—part theater, part ultimatum. President Donald Trump, glancing up from a pile of briefing papers, told reporters that he had crafted a plan to end the war in Ukraine and that time was running out. He put a date on it: November 27, the American Thanksgiving holiday. “At some point, he’s going to have to accept something,” the president said, in language that left no room for subtlety.
It was not a gentle invitation. The 28-point document that has circulated in diplomatic circles asks Ukraine to surrender large tracts of eastern territory, to shrink its military, to renounce any future bid to join NATO, and—critically—to forgo Western peacekeepers on its soil. In return, European fighter jets would be based in Poland and a fragile architecture of guarantees would be proposed. To many in Kyiv and across Europe, that architecture looks tilted toward Moscow.
Kyiv’s Response: “We Will Not Betray Our Land”
President Volodymyr Zelensky publicly pushed back. “We cannot and will not betray our people, our soldiers, or the soil that we have defended,” he told a press briefing, according to officials familiar with his remarks. Behind that sentence is more than rhetoric: it is a lived history of towns and fields scarred by conflict since Russia’s full-scale invasion on 24 February 2022.
“They are asking us to surrender the memory of those who fell defending their homes,” said Olena Mykhailenko, a teacher in a Kyiv suburb whose neighbourhood was shelled in the early days of the war. “This is not a map issue. It is our children’s future.”
A Map on the Table — and a Choice
Imagine a map spread across the cabinet table: blue and yellow shrinking; a large red swathe creeping into the east. Negotiators have always known that maps carry moral weight. One senior diplomat watching the exchanges grumbled that peace as proposed would be “a subtraction, not an agreement.” For Ukrainians on the frontlines, the idea that ceding territory could bring peace feels like a pyrrhic bargain.
President Trump argues that if Ukraine refuses, the fighting will continue and the ground they would have lost under the plan would be lost anyway. “They are very brave,” he said, nodding to Ukrainian forces. “But if they don’t accept, then you know, they should just keep fighting.” There is a grim logic in his words—one that treats war as a ledger you can balance with land—but it is a cold calculus for couples who will never return home.
What the Plan Demands
- Large-scale territorial concessions in the east of Ukraine
- A significant reduction in the size of Ukraine’s armed forces
- No NATO membership for Ukraine now or in the foreseeable future
- No Western peacekeeping force deployed on Ukrainian soil; European air forces based in Poland instead
These points, drawn from a draft document circulating among diplomats, have set off alarm bells in capitals across Europe and a chorus of resistance from Kyiv.
Voices from the Ground: Anger, Fear and Iron Will
Take a walk through the streets of Kyiv on a market day and you can feel the unnerving mixture of resilience and loss. Vendors hawk sun-ripened tomatoes beside piles of donated winter coats; a group of young men play chess outside a bomb-scarred building. “We are exhausted from fighting, but we are not exhausted from loving our country,” says Dmytro, a 32-year-old volunteer who supplies front-line units with rations. “Peace is not something you pay for in bits of land.”
In the Donetsk region, where the memory of lost villages is still fresh, older residents speak in quieter tones. “We have seen war promised and war broken into our lives for years,” says Mariana, 67, whose family farm sits near territory claimed by separatist forces and now by Russia. “I want my grandson to pick cherries from our trees, not shells.”
International Repercussions: Johannesburg and the G20 Rift
While negotiators and leaders sparred over a map, another stage opened half a world away. The G20 summit in Johannesburg drew presidents and prime ministers from across the globe—Emmanuel Macron, Narendra Modi, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Xi Jinping—yet conspicuously absent was the U.S. president. The administration explained the boycott by saying Johannesburg’s emphasis on multilateral trade and climate cooperation clashed with U.S. priorities; others read the absence as a diplomatic rebuke.
European leaders—watchful and uneasy—planned a side meeting with a clear message: “There should be nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine,” Europe’s bench of officials insisted. The insistence reflects a deeper seam of transatlantic friction: how to secure peace without selling sovereignty, and whether deadlines set by one capital should bind a nation under fire.
Beyond the Headlines: What Is Really at Stake?
This conflict—and the peace proposals now on the table—raises larger questions about how the world settles wars in the 21st century. Do we prioritize an immediate cessation of hostilities that may involve unacceptable compromises? Or do we insist on the restoration of borders and risk prolonged fighting, more death, and further destabilization across Europe?
Analysts note that peace plans that demand territorial concessions rarely settle the deeper grievances that ignite conflict. “Forced settlements without local buy-in are recipes for future tension,” says Anna Petrova, a conflict-resolution scholar. “Sustainable peace demands political reconciliation, security guarantees, and economic rebuilding that involve the affected communities themselves.”
Choices, Costs and Compromises
For Ukrainians, the choice is visceral and immediate. For global leaders, the choice is strategic and long-term. And for the rest of the world, there is a moral question: how do you balance the desire to end bloodshed with the duty to stand with a nation’s right to self-determination?
As you read these words, imagine those deadlines, maps, and summit rooms a little less abstractly. Imagine an elderly woman in the Donetsk countryside picking through the ruins of her orchard. Imagine a young father in Kyiv, checking the horizon for drones, dreaming of a future where his children can grow up without fear.
Where Do We Go From Here?
Diplomacy will grind on. Meetings will be scheduled and postponed. Back channels will hum with proposals, conditionalities, and red lines. And yet, the human imperatives remain straightforward: protect civilians, secure a durable settlement, and ensure any peace does not institutionalize injustice.
What would you accept to end a war? A deadline? A map? A guarantee? It is a question that coercive diplomacy cannot answer alone. It requires the messy, painful work of listening—to soldiers, survivors, and the small voices from towns that barely make the evening news.
In the coming days, as world leaders measure phrases and plot strategies in conference rooms, the real story will be written in markets, on front lines, around kitchen tables. That is where the bargain—if there is one—will live or die.
Trump oo laalay sharci ilaalinayay in la tarxiilo soomaalida minnesota
Nov 22(Jowhar)-Madaxweynaha Maraykanka Donald Trump ayaa ku dhawaaqay go’aan culus oo uu ku baabi’iyay dhammaan shuruucdii iyo hannaankii ilaalinayay in la tarxiilo Soomaalida soogalootiga ah ee ku nool gobolka Minnesota.
Minister warns COP30 negotiations have reached a difficult, crucial phase
Under the Fabric Ceiling: A Night of Tension and Smoke at COP30
Belém is humid in November; the air has the slow, deep breathe of the Amazon. At the COP30 conference venue, the day began with the bright, hopeful choreography of diplomats—name badges, quick smiles, last-minute briefings. By evening, the choreography had broken. A small fire licked a hole through the venue’s fabric ceiling and, for a time, literal daylight streamed into a room full of negotiators who had been arguing over whether the final climate text should even name the thing at the center of the crisis: fossil fuels.
It’s theatre and emergency all at once: the smell of smoke in a room whose purpose is to stop the world burning, negotiators shuttled into side-rooms, and a palpable sense that something more than a clause was at stake. “We came here to tell the truth,” said Ireland’s Minister for Climate, Energy and the Environment, Darragh O’Brien. “To leave it out of the text is inexplicable.”
What’s Missing: The Fossil Fuel Void
The draft final agreement that made its rounds through the conference seemed to have been written with a glaring omission: no explicit reference to fossil fuels, and no roadmap for a managed, just transition off them. For many—especially European delegations and a coalition of nearly 85 countries—this was less a drafting oversight and more a moral failure.
Why does that matter? Because fossil fuels remain the principal driver of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Around three-quarters of global CO2 emissions are tied directly to the burning of coal, oil and gas. Temperatures have already risen roughly 1.2°C above pre-industrial levels, and every fraction of a degree matters for heatwaves, sea-level rise, and ecosystems like the Amazon that are both carbon sinks and weather-makers.
The Letter That Stirred the Room
Earlier in the week, a bloc of 30 countries—composed of many EU members and partners including the UK, Colombia, Chile, Costa Rica, Panama, Palau and Mexico—delivered a stark letter to the COP30 Presidency. It said, bluntly, they couldn’t support a final outcome that failed to include a roadmap for a “just, orderly and equitable” transition away from fossil fuels. It also criticized the absence of strong commitments linking climate action to nature protection—no explicit language on halting deforestation, the letter noted, is “deeply concerning.”
Voices from Belém: Anger, Despair, Resolve
Human stories are what make negotiations matter. In a small circle near the conference’s coffee station, Juan Carlos Monterrey, Panama’s climate envoy, used uncompromising language. “A climate text that cannot mention fossil fuels is a climate text that refuses to speak the truth,” he said. “It fails the Amazon, it fails science, it fails justice, and it fails the people we are here to represent.”
On the ground, the scene mixed exhaustion and indignation. “We are standing here in the shadow of the forest and we cannot even agree to protect it,” said Ana Silva, a rubber-tapper who had come from a riverside community two hours outside Belém to observe. “My grandchildren ask me if the river will still be here. I do not have answers for them.”
An EU negotiator, speaking on condition of anonymity to convey an unvarnished mood, told me: “Europe is prepared to be constructive. But we cannot sign a blank check to the fossil fuel industry. Our citizens demand faster, fairer action.”
A Different Perspective: Sovereignty and Development
Not everyone at the conference saw omission as denial. A bloc of Arab nations and several African delegations expressed alarm at language that could be read as prescriptive on national energy choices. “Countries must maintain the right to decide their own energy mix,” said a delegate from an oil-producing country. “Development and energy security are not negotiable luxuries.”
That debate—between climate urgency and development rights—cuts to the heart of the COP process. It’s not merely technical drafting; it’s a clash of worldviews: priorities, histories of energy use, and the lingering scars of unequal development.
Why a Roadmap Matters
A “roadmap” is more than a bureaucratic artifact. For communities like Ana’s, it means time-bound plans, financial support, job retraining programs, and assurances that a transition won’t leave anyone behind. For investors and energy planners, it provides predictability. For scientists and activists, it offers an accountable pathway to close the emissions gap that current national pledges leave wide open.
Global emissions need rapid, deep cuts this decade to keep a 1.5°C pathway within reach. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has repeatedly said the next five to ten years are decisive. A roadmap anchored in equity would include:
- Clear timelines for phasing out coal and cutting oil and gas use, with safeguards for affected workers;
- Major public finance shifts toward clean energy and nature-based solutions;
- Mechanisms to assist low-income and climate-vulnerable countries with transition costs;
- Strong measures to halt deforestation and restore degraded ecosystems.
Local Color: Belém, the Amazon, and the Human Scale
Walking the streets around the conference, you feel Belém’s rhythms: market stalls piled with açaí and tacacá, the scent of fried fish, conversations that slip seamlessly between Portuguese and Indigenous languages. The Amazon is not an abstract carbon ledger here; it is the weather, the food, and the cultural backbone of people who read the forest’s signs daily.
“We do not want to be climate refugees,” said José Pereira, a fisherman from a riverside community. “The forest gives us fish. If you take that away, you take our life.”
What This Moment Means Globally
The standoff in Belém is a microcosm of a larger reality: the world is entangled in competing imperatives—economic development, geopolitical stability, and environmental limits. That tension will not vanish in a night or a plenary; it will require political courage, finance, and a reimagining of what prosperity looks like in a warming world.
Do we prioritize narrow national interests, or do we steward a shared planetary inheritance? It is the question negotiators are chewing through sleepless hours, and it is the question citizens should be asking their leaders back home.
Where Do We Go From Here?
Negotiators are expected to keep working into the small hours, to stitch together a text that may yet include compromise language on fossil fuels and nature. Whether that stitch holds will depend on more than who wins a sentence in a document—it will depend on the political will to fund transitions, protect forests, and ensure that those least responsible for warming don’t pay the highest price.
“We can’t let the confetti of diplomatic language hide what needs to change on the ground,” said Dr. Maria Alvarez, a climate policy researcher who has worked across Latin America. “Words matter, but so does money, and technology transfer, and legal mechanisms.”
So ask yourself: if the draft text becomes the final text, what will that mean for the child in Belém who plays beneath the forest canopy? For the oil worker in a coastal town who fears unemployment? For the islands watching sea levels rise? Climate negotiations are not theater for spectators. They are a line of action that either loosens or tightens around the neck of our collective future.
Tonight, in a humid hall with a hole in its ceiling, the world is deciding whether to call the crisis by name. That choice will echo far beyond Belém.
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