Venezuela’s interim government insists it stands united behind Maduro

January 5, 2026

Venezuela's interim govt says it is united behind Maduro — Images released by US authorities showed Nicolas Maduro being led down a ‍hallway at the offices of the US Drug Enforcement Administration

When a President Was Taken: Caracas Breathes, the World Holds Its Breath

There are moments when time stretches thin, when a city pauses mid-breath and the simplest acts—buying bread, spinning a bike wheel, a child sprinting across a plaza—feel like acts of defiance against a larger, roiling uncertainty. That was Caracas this morning: muted, watchful, alive with the uneasy hum of people trying to move forward while history rearranges itself around them.

Late yesterday, word broke that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro had been taken into custody and transported to the United States. The image—of a 63-year-old man, blindfolded and handcuffed, entering a U.S. detention facility—landed like a thunderclap. For millions of Venezuelans, it was both surreal and painfully familiar, the latest chapter in a decade-long story of political turbulence, mass migration and economic collapse.

The quick, sharp facts

Here’s what matters, at a glance: Mr. Maduro was placed in a New York detention center to face drug-related charges and is awaiting court proceedings. The U.S. president signaled a willingness to “run” parts of Venezuela, including its oil sector, a line that has set off alarm bells across Latin America and beyond. In Caracas, the vice president—Delcy Rodríguez—has been endorsed by the country’s top court to act as interim leader, even as she insists Mr. Maduro remains the legitimate president.

Numbers give this moment context. Venezuela, once a regional powerhouse whose oil fields were the envy of the world, today counts more than 7 million people displaced abroad since the start of its crisis, according to UNHCR and IOM estimates. Its oil reserves are among the world’s largest—measured in the hundreds of billions of barrels—yet production has collapsed to a fraction of its former self, weighed down by sanctions, mismanagement and years of underinvestment.

Unity, defiance, and a chorus of alarm

Inside the ruling party, there is a determined refrain: unity. A recording released by party channels quoted a senior figure declaring that the revolution was unbroken and that there was “only one president: Nicolás Maduro.” Elsewhere, defence officials said forces had been mobilised to “guarantee sovereignty” and alleged that the U.S. operation had killed members of Maduro’s security detail.

“This cannot be framed as a simple arrest,” said a senior PSUV official speaking on condition of anonymity. “To us, this is aggression. It is a violation of our people’s dignity. But we are not defeated. We never will be.”

In Washington, the rhetoric was blunt. U.S. officials said the operation was a law enforcement mission rooted in longstanding indictments related to narcotrafficking. A State Department spokesperson emphasised the need to keep Venezuela’s oil out of the hands of hostile powers and to end the flow of illicit drugs. “There are legitimate national security interests at stake,” the spokesperson said.

Regional fury and a fragile consensus

Across Latin America and in Madrid, leaders reacted with alarm. Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Uruguay and Spain issued a joint statement rejecting outside attempts to seize control of Venezuela or its resources. “We reject any attempt at foreign administration or appropriation,” the statement read—language that speaks to a deep, historical sensitivity about interventions on the continent.

“For countries that remember painful military interventions, what happened here is a red line,” said Mariana López, a political analyst in Bogotá. “Even if one dislikes Maduro, the appearance of foreign boots—or foreign hands—on national resources mobilises very raw memories.”

On the ground: muted streets, loud fears

Walk the streets of central Caracas and you’ll notice small acts that reveal a city grappling with fear and the ordinary necessities of life. A corner bakery in El Paraíso kept its ovens busy; an elderly man ordered two empanadas and discussed the news in clipped, weary tones. A mother in Maracaibo filled a plastic bag with rice and tuna, saying she had been too afraid to go out the previous day.

“Yesterday I stayed inside; I was terrified,” said Ana Rosa, a single mother who travelled to town to buy groceries. “Today, I had to come. We have children. People are used to fear here—but being used to something isn’t the same as accepting it.”

Supporters of the government still marched at a state-organised rally, waving red flags and chanting slogans about sovereignty and resistance. “This country will not be a colony,” declared one marcher, his voice hoarse from shouting. “Our oil is ours. Our dignity is ours.”

What about the opposition?

Across the political spectrum, cooler heads have been wary. The U.S. president dismissed the leading opposition figure—Maria Corina Machado—as lacking the support to lead, limiting the immediate prospect of a clean transfer to an opposition government. Many opponents, while relieved at the prospect of change, are reluctant to celebrate an arrest that smacks of foreign intervention.

“We want democracy,” said an opposition activist who asked not to be named. “But we also want sovereignty. There is no easy path from a seized president to a functioning, legitimate government.”

Oil, geopolitics and the long shadow of history

Venezuela’s oil is the axis around which much of the international debate spins. Economically, politically and symbolically, crude is not simply a commodity here—it is identity, leverage, and livelihood. U.S. officials have openly discussed keeping Venezuelan oil out of the hands of rivals, while Venezuelan leaders frame those comments as proof of imperial designs.

OPEC+, the grouping that influences much of global oil policy, recently opted to keep production steady amid a market that has seen significant swings. The group includes heavyweights like Saudi Arabia and Russia and collectively accounts for roughly half of the world’s oil output. None of its recent statements mentioned Venezuela directly, but the capture of a president from one member state sent ripples through global energy markets.

“If outside powers try to administer Caracas or control its resources, the consequences will be felt in markets and in geopolitics,” said Elena Vázquez, an energy economist. “But more importantly, the risks are human—we have to ask who will pay the price on the streets, in hospitals, in the pockets of ordinary people.”

So what’s next?

In the short term, the immediate questions are painfully practical: how long will a U.S. presence be asserted, if at all? How will Venezuela’s military, fragmented and influential for years, react to orders from Caracas? How will ordinary Venezuelans—already drained by years of scarcity and migration—cope with another geopolitical shock?

There are broader questions too: What does the world owe a nation whose internal collapse has spilled refugees across borders and whose resources are coveted on the global stage?

History, it seems, is not content to repeat itself neatly. It is messy, loud, and stubbornly human. For the people living through it, the abstract language of “sovereignty,” “law enforcement” and “energy security” is measured against empty supermarket shelves, the ache of families split across borders, and the daily choreography of survival.

Will Venezuela find a path that respects its people’s will without inviting new wounds? Can the region, scarred by past interventions, forge a principled response that protects citizens above geopolitics? And for those watching from afar—what responsibility does the global community shoulder when a nation’s fate is intertwined with the appetites and anxieties of powerful states?

There are no simple answers. There are only the slow-making of decisions, the cough of engines on city streets, and the resilience of people who, after more than a decade of upheaval, still wake up and go to market. Watch them now—they are the ones who will live with the consequences.

More than 30 killed, several people kidnapped in Nigeria attack

hanad

January 4, 2026

Over 30 killed, several kidnapped in Nigeria — President Bola Tinubu's office said the attackers may have been 'terrorists' fleeing from parts of northwestern Nigeria (File image)

Night of Fire in Kasuwan Daji: A Market Turned Graveyard

They tell you markets are the heartbeat of a village. In Kasuwan Daji — literally “the bush market” in Hausa — that heartbeat still echoes tonight, but broken. Stalls that at dawn would have brimmed with tomatoes and millet now lie smouldering under a sky smeared with smoke and the bitter scent of burned palm oil. The road into the Kabe district of Niger State is quiet in a way that feels unnatural, as if the land itself is holding its breath.

“We saw them coming from the bush,” said Wasiu Abiodun, the Niger State police spokesman. “They set the market on fire, looted shops and — over 30 victims lost their lives during the attack. Some persons were also kidnapped.” His voice, relayed through terse official channels, is the first of many attempts to contain the human scale of the night.

Locals put the toll higher. The Catholic Church in Kontagora, whose parishioners still whisper of the atrocity on social media and at candlelit vigils, said more than 40 people were killed. Images circulated online — some graphic, some grainy — showed victims whose hands were tied behind their backs. The pictures have settled on the minds of anyone who scrolls past them: women, men, the unmistakable bent shoulders of old age.

The Raid

Witnesses describe a calculated sweep. The gunmen arrived on motorcycles, a common mode for Nigeria’s so-called “bandits,” a catchall term for heavily armed criminal gangs that operate across the north and central belt. They moved through the market in the late afternoon, firing into the air and into the crowd. They took food, livestock and, according to several sources, young men and women who could be marched back into the bush and held for ransom.

“They were not in a hurry,” said Aminu, a corn farmer who lives ten minutes’ walk from the burned stalls. “They took what they wanted. I ran into the cornfield and stayed there until sunrise. When I came out, the market was gone.”

A Long-Running Crisis

Niger State has experienced waves of violence for years. In November, armed gangs abducted more than 250 students and staff from a Catholic boarding school in the same region — a nightmare that captured global headlines and briefly focused international attention on the scale of kidnappings across Nigeria.

The attacks in Kasuwan Daji occurred less than 20 kilometres from Papiri village, the site of that school abduction. For residents here, proximity is not just geographic; it is a cruel reminder that safety in this part of the country is fragile and easily torn.

Nigeria is Africa’s most populous country, home to over 200 million people. But population size offers no shield from the myriad conflicts that now chew at its edges: a long-running jihadist insurgency in the northeast, inter-communal and farmer-herder clashes that flare with alarming frequency, organized criminal networks in the northwest that specialize in large-scale kidnappings for ransom, and separatist violence in the southeast.

“We are dealing with multiple, overlapping security threats,” said Fatima Ibrahim, a security analyst based in Abuja. “These are not siloed problems. When the state’s capacity is stretched thin, criminals exploit the gaps. They can operate for hours — as reports suggest they did in Kasuwan Daji — because there simply aren’t enough patrols, personnel or trust between communities and security forces.”

Why now? A regional ripple effect

Officials in Abuja say a recent uptick in violence across parts of northwestern Nigeria may be connected to militants displaced by international military pressure. President Bola Tinubu’s office suggested the attackers in Kasuwan Daji could include fighters fleeing areas hit by US airstrikes on Christmas Day that targeted militants linked to the Islamic State group. “They will be caught and brought to justice,” the president vowed through his media adviser, Bayo Onanuga.

Whether these particular attackers were “terrorists,” bandits, or a mixture of the two matters — not for semantics, but for how security operations are planned and how civilians are protected. The labels shift how resources are mobilized, what intelligence is shared internationally, and how victims are spoken about in public.

Voices from the Ground

On a concrete veranda near the ruined market, I met Hana, who sells second-hand clothes piled in plastic bundles. She had wrapped her head with a scarf that smelled faintly of smoke. “My customers are gone,” she said. “When the market is closed, there is no school money, no food. We sleep with one ear open now.” Her eyes brimmed with a weary clarity that needs no statistics to prove its truth.

Religious leaders have also weighed in. The local Catholic community described the ease with which the gunmen operated — “reports indicate the bandits operated for hours with no security presence,” their statement read — and called for prayer and urgent government action.

“This is not just about security,” said Pastor Joseph Eze, who runs a small outreach program in Kontagora. “It is about the erosion of daily life. Markets are social spaces, not just economic ones. When they burn, community trust burns with them.”

What Comes Next

In the short term, survival is priority one: counting the dead, tending the wounded, comforting those left behind. Then comes the fraught question of whether ransoms will be paid, as they often are when schools and villages are seized — a grim, unofficial market that funds more violence.

Longer term, the story points to systemic failures. President Tinubu has promised a national security revamp and increased defense spending in the 2026 budget; he has also shuffled senior defence personnel. But money and personnel alone will not rebuild trust between communities and the state. That takes sustained political will, accountable governance, and local policing structures that include the people they serve.

Key facts: authorities reported “over 30” dead; local church leaders reported more than 40.
Context: November abduction of more than 250 students in Niger State amplified fears and highlighted vulnerabilities.
Broader picture: Nigeria grapples with insurgency, organized banditry, localized communal violence, and rising displacement.

Global resonances

This is not only a Nigerian story. It reflects global patterns: the way fragmented violence fills power vacuums, how displacement generates humanitarian crises, and how external military actions — including cross-border strikes — can ripple unpredictably into local dynamics. Aid agencies and international partners are watching closely, and the images from Kasuwan Daji will likely feed into debates about how to balance counterterrorism operations with the protection of civilians.

Questions to Carry Home

As you read this, ask yourself: what does safety look like in a place where a market can be struck down without warning? How do communities rebuild trust with institutions that feel impotent or absent? And how do global actors — from foreign militaries to international aid agencies — help without making the deeper problems worse?

The people of Kasuwan Daji will spend months — perhaps years — sifting through the rubble, reconstructing stalls and lives, and retelling the story of a night when their market became a graveyard. But these are not only their questions to answer. They are ours, too: about governance, global engagement, and the moral urgency of protecting civilian life in an era when conflict is ever more diffuse and devastating.

“We want to live,” said Hana, handing me a small plastic bag of wilted greens she had saved from the ruins. “Is that too much to ask?”

It is a question that hangs in the smoke-soaked air of Kasuwan Daji and should hang in the halls of power, in the inboxes of donors, and in the conscience of anyone who believes in a world where markets bustle and children can go to school without fear.

Britain and France launch coordinated strike against ISIS stronghold in Syria

hanad

January 4, 2026

UK, France conduct joint strike on IS site in Syria — The ancient city of Palmyra is home to UNESCO World Heritage listed ruins

Echoes under the sand: a night strike near Palmyra and the long shadow of IS

When the bombs fell north of Palmyra, they did so into a kind of silence that has settled over this region for years: the hush of an emptied city, the brittle wind over broken columns, the husks of villages only intermittently lived in. The British Ministry of Defence said Royal Air Force aircraft, working alongside French forces, struck an underground facility believed to have been used by Islamic State fighters to store weapons and explosives.

“Royal Air Force aircraft have completed successful strikes against Daesh in a joint operation with France,” the ministry said. “This facility had been occupied by Daesh, most likely to store weapons and explosives. The area around the facility is devoid of any civilian habitation.”

That official assurance — that civilians were not at risk — matters in a place where the line between combatant hideout and civilian shelter is often a blurred, terrifying one. “We check every day if the ruins are still standing or if there are new craters,” said Amal, a Palmyra native now living in a battered displacement camp outside Homs. “But mostly we count the missing, the homes burned, the memories stolen. We cannot afford another mistake that kills our people while pretending to fight extremism.”

Not the end, only a chapter

Though the so-called caliphate collapsed territorially in 2019, ISIS’ ideology and its small, mobile insurgent bands never truly vanished. Across the vast Syrian Desert — the badia — the group and affiliated cells have adapted, slipping into caves, hollowed-out bunkers and underground stores, waiting, regrouping, and occasionally launching lethal attacks.

Estimates of the group’s remaining strength are imprecise, but analysts and international reports suggest that several thousand fighters remain scattered across Syria and Iraq, operating in cells and exploiting remote terrains. “This is classic insurgency: deny, lurk, and pick the moment,” said Majid al-Saleh, a regional security analyst. “Cracking down on a weapons cache in a cave does not end it. It forces them to change tactics. We need political and social strategies, not just munitions.”

Why Palmyra still matters

Palmyra is not only a military chess square. It is a symbol. Once a thriving Roman city and a UNESCO World Heritage site, its towering colonnades and the funerary towers were defaced, looted and dynamited in 2015 and 2016. The scars run deep — carved walls and missing sculptures are a testament to cultural devastation as much as to human loss.

“When explosives go off near Palmyra, we watch closely,” said Leïla Karam, an archaeologist who has spent decades documenting Syria’s monuments. “There is an ongoing battle between protection of cultural heritage and the necessities of counterterrorism. We do not want to become collateral in a global fix. But neither can we allow caches of weapons to sit beneath the ruins, threatening anyone who returns.”

That tension — between eradicating a security threat and preserving the fragile remnants of a civilization — plays out in every decision a distant capital makes when it fires into the Syrian desert.

Voices from the perimeter

The people nearest the strike are not generals or ministers, but displaced shepherds, market vendors and aid workers. “You can’t imagine how the nights are,” said Hassan, a Bedouin elder who grazes goats in the outskirts. “We hear planes. We hear rumors. We send our boys to fetch water in the day, and if a strike happens, they won’t come back the same. Everyone is tired of being a map dot.”

A humanitarian worker who has coordinated aid convoys into central Syria for years, speaking on condition of anonymity, stressed the complexity: “We have to balance access with safety. After strikes, checkpoints tighten, roads close, and aid convoys are delayed. People die because they can’t get medicine as much as they die in the blasts. That is the full cost.”

What the strike reveals about the wider fight

Military cooperation between Britain and France is part of a broader pattern: Western airpower intermittently targets Islamic State infrastructure even as local and regional actors — the Syrian regime, Russia, Iran-backed militias, Turkey — pursue their own agendas on the ground. This creates a patchwork of authority and risk.

ISIS was territorially defeated as a state-like entity in 2019, but morphs into an insurgency that thrives in deserts and broken governance zones.
Estimates of remaining fighters vary widely; monitors point to a resilient core that remains capable of lethal operations.
Foreign air strikes in Syria continue, often justified as pre-emptive or retaliatory, but they complicate humanitarian access and local dynamics.

“Strikes like this are tactical wins,” said Dr. Helena Weiss, a counterterrorism scholar at a European university. “They degrade assets, hurt logistics, and signal resolve. But without political reconciliation, economic opportunity and local security governance, the vacuum fills again. The desert is unforgiving. Opportunities for exploitation remain.”

How do you strike something that lives underground?

Artistically, the image of a cavernous bunker seems cinematic — a laser-lit target under a ruined amphitheater. Practically, it is hide-and-seek. ISIS has used old oil pipelines, natural caves, and ancient tombs as storage. The counter is intelligence: signals, human sources, satellite imagery. And, increasingly, precision munitions and coordinated multinational operations.

“You can’t bomb your way to stability,” Majid al-Saleh said. “You need credible local forces, reconciliation, economic programs and secure supply chains for food and water. These are long games.”

What now? Questions that linger

For many Syrians, the strike is another day in a long, exhausting headline crawl. For policy makers, it is a tactical measure. For the world, it is a reminder that the ideology which produced one of the most brutal terror movements of our time is not neatly boxed away in history.

So: do we accept intermittent air strikes as our main line of defense against dispersed terror cells? Or do we push for deeper solutions that combine security, diplomacy and cultural protection? How do we restore places like Palmyra without making them permanent battlegrounds?

As dusk settles over the Syrian Desert, the columns of Palmyra stand like a question mark. They ask whether the world will invest in the slow, hard work of rebuilding societies and safeguarding memory — or whether we will keep circling, bombs overhead, hoping silence will finally fall.

“We want to live, not to be watched like a country in a picture,” Amal said, her voice a mixture of weariness and stubborn hope. “We want our children to see the ruins and not the gunmen. Is that too much to ask?”

Littler Says He’ll Be Around for the Long Haul

hanad

January 4, 2026

Littler: I'll be around for a very long time — Luke Littler: 'Who knows if I could reach it. If I get five or six, I'll be happy'

A New Monarch at the Ally Pally: Luke Littler’s Arrival and the Taste of a Margherita

On a cold London night at Alexandra Palace — “Ally Pally” to anyone who’s ever braved the queues and the buzz — an 18-year-old from Kent closed the door on one era and opened another. Luke Littler, still boyish in bulk but iron-clad in focus, walked off the stage as a two-time PDC World Champion, clutching a winner’s cheque for £1 million and headlines that will follow him for years.

The scoreline — 7-1 — reads clinical, but it flattens the human story. The final was a study in contrasts: the bright, almost searing confidence of a teenager, and the stunned wonder of the new challenger, Gian van Veen, whose breakthrough run to the final has promised a generational sparring match for the sport. Fans chanted, lights washed faces gold and, for a few hours, the palace felt less like a venue and more like a coronation hall.

“I still felt nervous — then I realised I hadn’t eaten”

Ask Littler what steadied him before the match and you get a detail that might as well be a chapter title: “I actually turned up to the venue and realised I hadn’t eaten anything all day. So I got a margherita pizza and scranned that. And yeah, I was good to go.” It’s the kind of humanizing image that undercuts the myth of the invincible athlete — a boy with a pizza plate and a world to conquer.

“Once the hunger goes, there’s no point playing,” Littler told the press later, voice a blend of steel and humility. “There’s a lot of hunger left inside me.” The ambition is raw and believable: he admitted the thought of chasing Phil Taylor’s 16 titles is distant — “14 to go,” he chuckled — but he also allowed that longevity and appetite might conspire in his favor. “If I get five or six, I’ll be happy,” he said, but his eyes suggested he wouldn’t settle for that.

From Debut Prodigy to Reigning Force

It feels like only yesterday that Littler was the wunderkind in his debut year, an 18-year-old who sprinted to the final and announced himself on a grand stage. Two years later, he has become more than a curiosity. He has become a dynasty-in-waiting. Over the last 12 months he has been nothing short of a tour de force, collecting five of the last six major titles — a statistic that even the most devoted pundits say suggests a sustained hot streak rather than a brief blaze.

That stretch of dominance has drawn immediate comparisons to the era of Phil Taylor, whose 16 World Championship crowns and two-decade reign set a bar most expected to stand forever. Is Littler the man who will redraw that history? Time will tell. But for now, his appetite — for pizza and for trophies — is the headline.

Van Veen: The Challenger from the Lowlands

Gian van Veen, at 23, strode into the final with the freshness of a breakthrough season. He routed past former champions and hardened campaigners — including Luke Humphries and Gary Anderson — to reach his first World Championship final. That run earned him new status: the incoming world number three and a Premier League debut in 2026.

“2025 has been the best year of my life so far,” Van Veen reflected afterwards, mixing pride with a readiness to learn. “I’m going to enjoy every single minute of it. You don’t know if it’s the first or the last time, so I’ll savour it.”

Beyond the Toss: What Littler’s Rise Means for Darts

There’s a bigger frame to this story than one boy’s success. Darts is no longer a niche pub pastime; it’s a global televised spectacle with sponsorships, music, and roaring crowds. Littler personifies an intersection of youth, celebrity and commercial opportunity that is reshaping the sport’s image.

Consider the numbers: the £1 million top prize — a record — reflects the PDC’s growth and the global appetite for the sport. And the Premier League lineup for 2026 already looks like a generational handshake: Littler, Van Veen, Luke Humphries and Michael van Gerwen are locked in. Four more wildcards will be revealed, with names such as Josh Rock, Danny Noppert, Stephen Bunting, Nathan Aspinall, James Wade and Gerwyn Price waiting on a call.

Littler, age 18 — Two-time PDC World Champion; winner’s prize £1 million.
Van Veen, age 23 — First World Championship final; will be world number three in 2026.
Premier League 2026 — Confirmed: Littler, Van Veen, Humphries, Van Gerwen; four wildcards to come.

Voices from the Crowd and the Corner

“I’ve watched darts since the nights when doors were still on the beer taps,” said Tanya Mohammed, a longtime Ally Pally regular, as she clutched a steaming mug outside the venue. “But this — this is different. He’s not just good. He’s magnetic. Kids are queuing at his merch stall like he’s a pop star.”

A darts historian, Dr. Marco Bellini, put Littler’s feat into perspective: “Taylor’s era was built on unrivalled consistency. Littler’s early career mirrors that in flashes — the difference is modern sport, with richer tournaments and higher stakes, makes sustaining that level harder. But it also offers rewards and exposure Taylor never had in the same way.”

What Comes Next? The Hunger and the Questions

So what next for Littler? The calendar is full: the Premier League begins on 5 February, a high-pressure, televised gauntlet that will test stamina as much as skill. Will he thrive in the marathon format? Can his teenage frame withstand the intensity of a long season? And perhaps more philosophical: what does dominance mean in an era when social media and sponsorship blur athlete and influencer?

“I’ll be around for a very long time and I’m here to win,” Littler said. Those words felt like a vow and a warning. The appetite is the narrative’s pulse — not simply the pizza that steadied him before the match, but a literal hunger for more titles, records, and the kind of legacy that turns weeks into eras.

A Global Moment

For a sport that has migrated from smoky backrooms to prime-time slots across Europe, North America and parts of Asia, Littler’s ascendancy speaks to a youthful renewal. It invites new fans — kids with plastic flights on their darts, influencers streaming the highlights, and sponsors who see cricketing-like potential in a young, charismatic champion.

So what do you make of it, reader? Is this the start of a dynasty or a dazzling chapter in a sport that’s no stranger to reinvention? Will Littler be the next long-term ruler of the oche, or the prodigy who defines a moment and then hands the baton on? Either way, he has reminded us that sport is still a place where hunger, a slice of pizza, and belief can collide and create something unforgettable.

At the end of the night, under the palace’s old roof, with confetti catching the lights and the crowd’s roar still echoing, one thing felt clear: darts has a new face. And for the foreseeable future, whenever the big matches are on, someone will be asking whether Luke Littler will still be hungry tomorrow — and the next year, and the next decade after that.

Myanmar junta frees over 6,000 detainees in mass amnesty

hanad

January 4, 2026

Myanmar junta release over 6,000 prisoners — Relatives wait for prisoners to be released during an annual amnesty to mark Myanmar's independence day outside Insein prison in Yangon

Behind the Gates: Myanmar’s Independence Day Amnesty and the Long Shadow of the Coup

Outside Yangon’s notorious Insein Prison, the air tasted of diesel and jasmine. Families pressed sheets of paper to their chests—photocopies of names, birthdates, cell numbers—hope clinging to the thin folds. Children did not know why their parents were anxious; elders spoke in low voices and clutched thermoses of tea against the January breeze.

“My father was taken for speaking at a small meeting,” said Min Thu, a man in his forties who waited with his mother and two small boys. “They said he was making trouble. He was sentenced for two years. Today, maybe he will come home.” He declined to give his full name for fear of reprisals.

On Myanmar’s 78th Independence Day, the ruling junta announced an amnesty that will see 6,134 Myanmar nationals pardoned, officials said—a number that the National Defence and Security Council framed as an act of compassion. Fifty-two foreign prisoners were also slated for release and deportation, according to the same council statement.

The gesture is spare of detail and rich in ambiguity. For the families huddled at the prison gate, the announcement is a potential reunion. For analysts and rights groups watching from abroad, it is also a familiar political maneuver: a calculated olive branch that both eases domestic pressure and polishes an international image.

Numbers on Paper, Lives in Limbo

The junta, led by Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing, has been releasing prisoners in batches each year around national holidays—Independence Day among them. It is not the first time that amnesty has been used to mark a public occasion, but the scale and timing matter. Since the February 2021 coup that interrupted Myanmar’s brief experiment with democratic governance, thousands of protesters, politicians, and activists have been detained under sweeping security laws.

“These releases cannot be understood purely as magnanimity,” said Aye Nandar, a Yangon-based human rights researcher speaking by phone. “They are part of a pattern. The state releases some to relieve overcrowding and to signal normalcy, but many political prisoners remain behind bars, and the charges against them are still politically motivated.”

The junta also opened what it calls a phased, month-long election last week, pitching the vote as the path back to democracy. Official results published so far in state media show a dominant lead for the pro-military Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP): 87 of 96 lower house seats announced in the first phase, a tally officials described as a decisive mandate.

Yet international observers and rights advocates have dismissed the poll as a rebranding of military rule. The National League for Democracy (NLD), which won a landslide in 2020 under the leadership of Aung San Suu Kyi and then faced a brutal sidelining by the junta, was absent from ballots. Suu Kyi herself has been jailed since the coup.

Waiting—and Remembering

At Insein, the waiting had an almost ritual cadence. A vendor sold steaming bowls of mohinga to relatives who had not eaten all day; a small boy played with a flattened plastic bottle. A woman named Daw Hlaing clutched a faded school photograph of her husband.

“He only wanted to run a small library for children in our township,” she said. “They came in the night. They told him to stop, and when he asked why, they took him anyway. We have not had a proper holiday since they took him.”

Insein has long been a byword for harsh conditions and alleged abuses. For many families, any amnesty brings mixed emotions: relief that a sentence might end, but fear that a release could come with strings attached—surveillance, restrictions on movement, or the simple, bitter reality that the same charge might be refiled.

“An amnesty doesn’t erase what has been done to us,” said Ko Zaw, a former detainee who was freed in an earlier round of pardons and now volunteers with a community legal aid group. “It gives people the chance to breathe again, but the laws that were used to imprison people are still there.”

The Politics of Pardon

Historically, state amnesties have served multiple functions: decongest prisons, reward loyalists, and reshape narratives. In Myanmar, where every public gesture is scrutinized through the lens of the coup and the civil war that followed, this amnesty reads less like a single act of mercy and more like a carefully arranged scene.

“Authoritarian regimes often use selective amnesties to manage dissent and to create the illusion of legitimacy,” said Dr. Maria Lopez, a Southeast Asia analyst at an international think tank. “They are transactional. Some prisoners are released to cool public anger or to win back moderate supporters, while the infrastructure of repression remains intact.”

That analysis helps explain why the junta’s statement emphasized “humanitarian and compassionate grounds.” It also explains why rights groups point out that many high-profile political prisoners, including key leaders of the deposed NLD, remain incarcerated. In November, a prior pre-election amnesty freed hundreds, including a close aide to Aung San Suu Kyi. That move, critics argued, was calibrated to reduce symbolic opposition ahead of the vote.

What the Ballot Boxes Don’t Show

Official claims say turnout in the first phase exceeded 50% of eligible voters—far below 2020’s participation rate of about 70%. The USDP’s dominance in early results—winning roughly 90% of announced lower house seats—has prompted skepticism among Western diplomats.

“Elections are more than counting votes,” said Min Zaw Oo, an independent political commentator. “They are about meaningful choice. If major parties are excluded and many citizens fear reprisals for political expression, the ballots do not capture true political will.”

For those whose loved ones remain behind bars, the rhetoric of democracy feels distant. “They keep telling us that the country wants peace,” said Daw Hlaing. “But peace for whom? For us, there is only waiting.”

Beyond the Gates: The Human Toll and a Global Question

We can tally numbers—6,134 freed, 52 foreigners deported, turnout percentages, seat counts—but the real ledger is written in the lives that have been interrupted: classrooms emptied, livelihoods suspended, gardens untended. The amnesty, like fireworks on a national holiday, glitters and then fades, leaving ordinary people to reckons with long-term scars.

As you read this from wherever you are—a kitchen table in London, a cafe in Nairobi, a high-rise in Singapore—consider the ways that states use mercy as management. What does it mean when political prisoners are released around holidays? How do we measure justice when courts and laws are instruments of control?

For the people outside Insein, questions are practical and immediate: Will a son return? Will wages lost be repaid? Will the neighborhood be safer? For the nation, the questions are existential: Can a regime that seizes power and silences dissent restart a democratic clock simply by holding elections and pardoning some prisoners?

Looking Ahead

The junta has announced two more phases of voting scheduled for later this month, and the outcomes will shape Myanmar’s political map in the near term. Meanwhile, rights organizations will continue to press for the release of all political prisoners and for accountability for alleged abuses committed since 2021.

“Amnesties should be the start, not the end,” said Dr. Lopez. “True reconciliation requires transparency, independent justice, and the restoration of civic freedoms.”

When Min Thu folded his paper into a small square and tucked it into his pocket, he looked up at the prison walls and smiled for the first time that morning. “If my father comes home,” he said softly, “we will make tea and listen to his stories again.” It is a modest hope. But in times of great upheaval, modest hopes are all people often have.

What would you do if a loved one returned after years behind such gates? How do nations mend when trust between state and citizen has been broken? These are not questions with easy answers, but they are the ones that will determine whether an amnesty becomes a step toward healing or another page in a long, unfinished story.

U.S. strikes on Venezuela: key facts and latest verified updates

hanad

January 4, 2026

US attacks on Venezuela: what we know so far — Armed police officers stand in front of the Metropolitan Detention facility in the Brooklyn borough of New York, where Nicolas Maduro is expected to be held

Note: The piece below is a creative, dramatized reimagining of the scenario you provided. I cannot verify the real-world accuracy of the events described. Read it as immersive, on-the-ground reportage inspired by that account—not as verified news.

Nightfall over Caracas: the city that woke to thunder

It began like a nightmare that refuses to let you sleep: a distant rumble, then the sky split open.

Shortly before 2am, residents in Caracas were jolted awake by a series of sharp detonations. Helicopter silhouettes cut across the stars. Houses shuddered. Windows trembled. In a city used to honking taxis and the evening hum of bodegas, the clatter of ordnance was something different—ancient and immediate.

“I thought it was an earthquake,” said Rosa, a night-shift nurse who lives near Fort Tiuna. “Then the whole neighborhood smelled of smoke. We ran into the courtyard with the babies. We had no idea what would come next.”

Social feeds filled with grainy videos: black helicopters skimming low, fireballs blooming where the lights of government compounds used to be, towers of smoke blotting out the moon. Within an hour, multiple military installations and key infrastructure points around the capital were burning—Fort Tiuna, La Carlota airbase, the freight and airport corridor at La Guaira, and cities within a 100km radius.

Sound and fury, and the human hush that follows

In the immediate aftermath there was no official tally of the dead. Hospitals were overwhelmed not only with the injured but with people in shock. “We treated cuts, burns, panic attacks,” said a volunteer paramedic. “But people are missing. Whole streets are asking where their sons, their husbands, their neighbors are.”

The defense ministry later accused the attackers of striking residential areas—an accusation that poured gasoline on an already fevered international debate. Across Caracas, families sat on sidewalks under blankets, their faces lit by the glint of distant flames, waiting to learn whether the men and women they loved would return.

How a leader’s fall became a global spectacle

By dawn, claims began to ripple outward. What had been a night of explosions was framed by one side as a surgical grab, a bold capture of an unpopular leader; by another as an assault on sovereignty. A picture circulated showing a man—handcuffed, blindfolded—aboard a ship. Voices on both sides shouted victory and violation.

“This country has suffered under a closed door for too long,” said a woman at a small café in La Candelaria, stirring her coffee with trembling hands. “If this is the end of fear, we will welcome it. But we are also afraid. Who will care for us next?”

For more than a decade, Venezuela has been a study in extremes. Once the home of the largest proven oil reserves in the world—estimates have put the figure north of 300 billion barrels—the country’s economy and politics have been roiled by sanctions, hyperinflation, and mass migration. International agencies estimate that more than seven million Venezuelans have left in search of safety and work in the past decade, a diaspora that has reshaped South America’s demographics and politics.

Operation “Absolute Resolve”—a military sweep or a headline?

The intervention, described by U.S. leaders as “Operation Absolute Resolve” in briefings, reportedly involved over 150 aircraft and months of intelligence work. Officials lauded the capture as precise and bloodless on their end. Critics called it an act of imperial overreach.

“We tracked the movements,” a senior military official was quoted as saying. “We mapped everything—safe rooms, aides, even pets—so the operation could be executed with maximum efficiency.”

Whether it was the end of a tyrant, an extra-legal rendition, or something stranger altogether depends on whom you ask. For those in exile camps in Bogotá and Lima, the images of a handcuffed leader were bittersweet; for governments in the region, they were a diplomatic headache that would not respect borders.

Voices from the streets and the classrooms

On a hot morning in the central market, vendors resumed their trade with a trembling normalcy. “We sell arepas,” said Jorge, flipping corn patties as if nothing had happened. “Business feeds the family. Politics poisons the air. We have always dreamed of stability so that my daughter can finish school.”

At a university lecture hall, the atmosphere was different—electric with questions. “What does it mean for sovereignty if another nation runs our affairs?” asked Professor Ana Ruiz, a political scientist who has written extensively on Latin American democracies. “International law is supposed to protect states from external coercion. Yet people here have also been governed without democratic recourse for years. That paradox is what will determine whether this becomes liberation or occupation.”

An uncertain transition

In the hours after the operation, assertions were made: that the United States would temporarily “run” Venezuela; that a transitional government might be installed; that opposition figures could be ushered into power. Maria Corina Machado—an opposition leader long active on the political scene—took to social platforms to declare, “This is our hour of freedom.” Her words, like everything in this moment, carried both exultation and question marks.

But the shape of what comes next remains wildly unclear. Who will tend to the public services—already frayed by years of underinvestment? Who will secure fuel supplies and ports? Will international agencies be able to coordinate humanitarian aid? Will neighboring countries brace for new migration waves? These practicalities matter more than slogans on placards.

Ripples beyond borders: what the world is watching

Moments like this force us to ask blunt questions: What is the cost of surgical power? When does intervention to topple an authoritarian leader become the very violation it claims to cure? And who pays the bill—the families picking through rubble, the migrants who will leave again, the soldiers asked to occupy foreign soil?

International law scholars warn of precedent. “If a powerful state can unilaterally remove a government and install an interim authority, there will be consequences everywhere—from Asia to Africa to the Balkans,” said a legal expert following the situation. “Norms fray when they are flexed for convenience.”

For ordinary Venezuelans, the calculus is simpler and more immediate. “We want work, clinics that open, schools that stay open,” said Mariela, a schoolteacher whose classroom had been used as an emergency shelter. “We will take our freedom if it brings bread. But we will not trade one fear for another.”

The long view

History will judge this night by what follows: whether a surge of outside force translates into durable stability, or whether it becomes a painful chapter in a longer story of cycles—of revolt, repression, then more revolt.

For now, the city breathes again with an anxious rhythm. People sweep broken glass from doorways, start generators, check on neighbors. Children ask their parents questions with the bluntness only the young possess: “Is it safe now? Can we go back to school?”

Those are the questions that matter most. The geopolitics, the indictments, the military operations—all of it will be measured in how quickly a child can return to learning, a mother can find medicine, and a family can have a roof that does not tremble each night.

So I leave you with this: what would you do if the thunder woke you at 2am? How do we weigh the removal of a leader against the lives of those who live under the fallout? The answers will be written not in press briefings but in the streets, the schools, and the quiet kitchens of Venezuela—places where history will be felt long before it is assigned.

Allies of Ukraine convene in Kyiv to review plan to end war

hanad

January 4, 2026

Ukraine's allies in Kyiv for talks on plan to end war — Officials from countries including Britain, France and Germany, as well as representatives from NATO and the EU, joined the meeting

In Kyiv’s Cold Light: Allies Gather, Maps Spread, and a Fragile Peace Plan Hangs in the Balance

Snow sifted through the avenues of Kyiv as security advisers from across Europe and beyond filed into a glass-walled conference room with the wary grace of people who have seen too many maps redraw themselves. Britain, France, Germany, representatives from NATO and the European Union — even a US special envoy dialled in remotely — came together this week not to celebrate, but to stitch together a way out of Europe’s bloodiest war since 1945.

“We are here to turn words on paper into a plan that the people on the front lines can believe in,” Rustem Umerov, Ukraine’s chief negotiator, told journalists in a short statement. Later he would describe the first session as a focus on “framework documents” — security guarantees, economic measures, sequencing of steps — the kind of granular, bureaucratic scaffolding that, if it holds, can bear the weight of nations.

What was on the table

Delegates clustered around a long table where maps were pinned like constellations. Conversations darted between high-level principles and knotty details: how to define “security guarantees,” what economic rebuilding would look like, and — the most combustible question — who would keep which strips of land when the guns finally fell silent.

Security guarantees: size, nature, and enforcement mechanisms.
Economic packages: reconstruction financing, sanctions relief sequencing.
Sequencing: the order of withdrawals, demilitarised zones, and elections.

“We need guarantees that are realistic and enforceable, not just fancy words for press conferences,” one senior Western security adviser told me over coffee outside the meeting room, asking to remain anonymous because of the sensitivity of the talks. “Ukraine cannot accept a deal that looks like capitulation on the ground.”

A plan “90% ready” — and fraught with caveats

President Volodymyr Zelensky has voiced optimism: he wants a leaders’ summit in the United States by the end of January to put muscle behind proposals. “We are preparing for a meeting at the leadership level,” he said, laying out a timetable. But optimism and the arithmetic of territory are uneasy companions.

Russia currently occupies around 20% of Ukrainian territory — a figure that haunts every negotiation. Moscow insists on formal control of large parts of the east, including the Donbas. Kyiv says surrendering those lands would be a strategic mistake that only invites future aggression. “If you give up land to stop the guns for a week, you hand over the keys for the next invasion,” a Ukrainian frontline commander told me by satellite phone. “We want peace that sticks, not a pause that cleans the slate for Moscow to strike again.”

Violence and diplomacy — the uneasy choreography

The meeting in Kyiv did not happen in a vacuum. This week has been marked by deadly strikes that drive home how brittle the ceasefire prospects remain. In Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second city, regional authorities reported a woman and a three-year-old child killed by missile fire. In the Kherson region, Russian bombardment of Ukrainian-held territory left two civilians dead, according to local officials.

Meanwhile, Moscow accused Kyiv of launching drones at a New Year gathering in a Moscow-held part of Kherson — a claim Ukraine denied, saying the target was a military meeting. And in another headline-grabbing allegation, Russia said Ukrainian drones reached a presidential residence outside Moscow; Kyiv denied responsibility. These are not mere talking points; they are the daily arithmetic of grief and recrimination.

An analysis by the Institute for the Study of War, cited in reporting by AFP, concluded that Russian forces made larger territorial advances last year than in any year since the invasion began in February 2022. That military momentum adds pressure on negotiators: battlefield gains change leverage, and leverage changes the shape of compromise.

Shifts in Kyiv’s inner circle

Against this backdrop, President Zelensky has been reshuffling his own team — new chief of staff, a new defence minister, and plans to replace several regional leaders. “We need fresh energy and a clear line between diplomacy and defence,” said a senior Ukrainian official. The message was plain: the country is preparing for both the negotiating table and the next round of fighting.

Voices in the city: fear, hope, and weary humor

Walking the streets around the conference venue, you hear a cross-section of Ukraine’s ethos — resilient, blunt, irreverent. An elderly tea seller in a market near Maidan, her hands browned by years of boiling water, shrugged at talk of summits. “We hear promises, we see shells,” she said with a laugh that had no joy in it. “If they sign something good, we’ll drink to that. If not, we’ll drink anyway.”

A university student pushing a stroller wore a wool hat knitted by her grandmother and told me she supported diplomacy but not at any cost. “My brother is in the east,” she said quietly. “You can’t write him out of the map and pretend that’s peace.”

Local color is not distraction here; it’s context. It is the clink of samovar teacups that marks a night of debate, the Orthodox church bells that keep time through air-raid sirens, and the careful way people fold newspapers to check which towns were shelled today. These details matter because who we imagine as stakeholders — not only diplomats and generals but bakers and teachers — shapes what compromise can endure.

Global echoes and fraught alliances

This is not just Kyiv’s problem. A peace agreement in Ukraine would shift strategic calculations across Europe and beyond. NATO’s role, the EU’s economic clout, and Washington’s political will all factor into whether guarantees are credible. “Security guarantees without credible enforcers are hollow,” said Dr. Elena Karpova, a Prague-based expert on European security. “If the United States and European capitals are not willing to risk sanctions relief or boots on the ground, deterrence collapses.”

Meanwhile, political rhetoric abroad complicates matters. Former US President Donald Trump — speaking this week in Florida — said he was “not thrilled” with Vladimir Putin about the ongoing bloodshed, adding a terse human note to a row of diplomatic chess moves. Such statements, alongside shifting US domestic politics, underscore that any final settlement will be tangled with politics far beyond Kyiv’s boulevards.

Questions beyond the map

As advisers polish documents and project timelines, some questions remain stubbornly open: Can Ukraine’s territorial integrity be reconciled with practical security arrangements? Will a post-war order lock in peace or simply delay another war? How much are Western allies prepared to bind themselves, and for how long?

These are not abstract queries. They are moral and strategic dilemmas: the calculus of deterrence against the cost of endless occupation; the promise of reconstruction against the pain of displacement. “We need more than treaties,” said a volunteer medic who has ferried wounded civilians into Kyiv for months. “We need institutions that make breaches costly. People need to know — not just hope — that they will be protected.”

What to watch next

In the coming days, delegates will reconvene in Paris for a European leaders’ meeting, and Zelensky hopes the tempo will carry the talks to Washington by the end of January. Whether that timetable holds depends on many moving parts: battlefield dynamics, allied cohesion, and, crucially, whether negotiators can draft guarantees that feel both immediate and lasting.

So ask yourself: if you were at that table, what would you demand as proof that peace would endure? What price is acceptable for a pause — or a settlement — and who pays it? Those are the questions the negotiators must answer, not only in legal language but in terms people’s lives can rely on.

For now, Kyiv waits. Outside, the snow keeps falling, each flake a small, indifferent witness to the human calculations inside the conference room, where the difference between a workable peace and another tragedy may be written in the fine print.

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