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Americans exhausted by the firehose of news in 2025 were being offered a brief respite Wednesday, as Fat Bear Week got under way in Alaska.The annual tongue-in-cheek contest pits bears against each other as they stuff themselves with salmon to prepare for months of hibernation.The unwitting competitors — known only by their numbers — battle it out in a series of head-to-head votes, with hundreds of thousands of people around the world expected to cast a ballot.The winner at the end of the week will be the bear voters judge to have piled on the most pounds.The online contest began in 2014 with just a few thousand people voting, but has now turned into an outsize exercise in democracy.Organizers said that around 1.2 million votes were cast from more than 100 countries in Fat Bear Week 2024.”Like a bear’s body mass in late summer, anticipation for the tournament continues to grow,” said a statement from Katmai Conservancy and Explore.org, who organize the contest.”Last year, 128 Grazer won her second Fat Bear Week championship and became the first mother bear to win. Does she have the size and story to earn a three-peat?”Voters compare before-and-after pictures of the enormous animals in Katmai National Park, Alaska to see which one looks best equipped to thrive in the lean months of hibernation.The aim is to raise awareness of brown bears and their habitat in Alaska, and the risks they face from human activity.Around 2,000 bears in the park start chubbing up in late summer and early fall. They can eat up to 100 pounds (45 kilograms) of salmon a day as they prepare for five months of hibernation.During the deep sleep, the animals rarely wake to eat, drink or even go to the toilet, emerging famished — and a lot thinner — in the spring.Voting in this year’s poll — at explore.org/fat-bear-week — closes at 5:00 pm Tuesday in Alaska (0100 GMT Wednesday).

US President Donald Trump mocked Joe Biden Wednesday by putting a picture of a so-called “autopen,” instead of his likeness, in a new gallery of presidential portraits in the White House.Republican Trump has alleged, without evidence, that Biden’s use of the automated technology to sign pardons and other documents was part of a cover-up of the Democrat’s cognitive decline.Now he has doubled down on the allegation by putting a picture of Biden’s signature and the device, in place of his portrait, in a new “Walk of Fame” located in the colonnade that runs along the White House Rose Garden.”The Presidential Walk of Fame has arrived on the West Wing Colonnade. Wait for it…” Trump’s Communications Advisor Margo Martin posted on X along with a video of the new display.The camera pans along a line of black and white, gold-framed presidential portraits, hanging along the colonnade in chronological order, before it  reaches the picture of the autopen representing Biden.The White House separately posted a photo of Trump himself — whose portraits as the 45th and 47th US president are on either side of Biden’s — looking at the new addition.The Biden autopen portrait will be visible by guests attending a dinner later Wednesday in the Rose Garden, where Trump has recently replaced the grass with a patio.Trump had previewed the move in an interview with the conservative Daily Caller earlier this month, saying: “We put up a picture of the autopen.”The 79-year-old almost obsessively bashes his now 82-year-old predecessor, seeking to blame him for a host of ills including inflation and the wars in Ukraine and Gaza.The Biden autopen portrait is meanwhile the brashest step yet in billionaire property developer Trump’s revamp of the more than 200-year-old presidential residence in Washington.Trump notably has covered the Oval Office with gold decorations, installed huge flagpoles and is now building a giant ballroom.He has also moved a painting of Democrat Barack Obama from its original position and, breaking with precedent, hung several paintings of himself in the White House.

US President Donald Trump demanded an investigation Wednesday into what he called “triple sabotage” after an escalator, teleprompter and sound system malfunctioned as he addressed the United Nations.The UN has said the events that happened while Trump was at its headquarters in New York on Tuesday were accidental, and partly blamed them on White House staff.But in a long, angry social media post, Trump described the string of mishaps as “very sinister,” called for people to be arrested and said the Secret Service was also probing.”This wasn’t a coincidence, this was triple sabotage at the UN. They ought to be ashamed of themselves,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.”I’m sending a copy of this letter to the Secretary General, and I demand an immediate investigation. No wonder the United Nations hasn’t been able to do the job that they were put in existence to do.” Footage showed the 79-year-old president and First Lady Melania Trump getting on the escalator at UN headquarters on Tuesday before it stopped with a lurch, forcing them to walk up.Then, as he began his speech, he noted his teleprompter was not working.He spent much of the rest of the speech bashing the world body, accusing it of funding illegal migration that was turning Western countries into “hell” and failing to support his peace efforts in Gaza and Ukraine.But while Trump struck a mostly joking tone about the escalator, his mood hardened a day later.”A REAL DISGRACE took place at the United Nations yesterday. Not one, not two, but three very sinister events!” he wrote.Trump said the escalator stop could have been a “real disaster.””It’s amazing that Melania and I didn’t fall forward onto the sharp edges of these steel steps, face first,” he said.Trump then complained that his teleprompter for his speech was “stone cold dark” for the first 15 minutes, and that the sound in the UN auditorium was “completely off.”The US president called for the security tapes for the escalator to be saved, adding: “The Secret Service is involved.”- UN points to White House -UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric on Tuesday issued a statement addressing the uproar, saying a videographer from the US delegation “may have inadvertently triggered the safety function” on the escalator.”Regarding the teleprompter, we have no comment since the teleprompter for the US president is operated by the White House,” he said.A Secret Service official, speaking on condition of anonymity, told AFP the agency was “looking into what the UN said to corroborate it.”Reached for comment after Trump’s post on Wednesday, a UN official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, pointed to Dujarric’s earlier statement.Regarding the alleged sound issues, the official said: “The sound system was designed to allow people at their seats to hear speeches being translated into six different languages through earpieces.”Mike Waltz, the newly installed US ambassador, said on X that he had formally demanded the “complete results” of the UN’s probe of the escalator incident, as well as a “detailed explanation of the teleprompter failure’s root cause, along with immediate plans to implement robust preventive measures.””The United States will not tolerate threats to our security or dignity at international forums. We expect swift cooperation and decisive action,” Waltz added.

The United States said Wednesday it was in talks with Argentina on a $20 billion program of economic support, buoying the South American nation’s markets and embattled leader Javier Milei.The right-wing Milei, a close ally of US President Donald Trump, has been struggling to ease market jitters ahead of midterm elections, which could determine the future of his austerity agenda.The battered peso rebounded after US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced his department was negotiating with Argentine officials on “a $20 billion swap line.”Argentina’s currency rose 1.8 percent to 1360 pesos to the dollar on the announcement, which came a day after Bessent and Trump held talks with Milei in New York.Since Friday, the peso has gained over 10 percent.Bessent added that Washington was also ready to buy Argentina’s dollar bonds, among other measures.”As President Trump has stated, we stand ready to do what is needed to support Argentina,” he wrote on X.Milei thanked the US president and Bessent for their “support and confidence.”In a later address to the UN General Assembly in New York, he lavished praise on Trump for saving the United States and the world from “catastrophe,” citing the Republican president’s migration and trade policies.”We are not…the only ones making the difficult decisions demanded by this historical moment,” he said. “President Trump, in the United States, also understands that it is time to reverse a dynamic that was leading the United States to a catastrophe, and we know that a catastrophe in the United States is a global catastrophe,” he added.- ‘Inherited a mess’ -Swap lines are transactions that usually involve two central banks agreeing to swap their currencies at a set exchange rate for a specified period.It is unclear, however, whether the talks with Argentina involve the US Federal Reserve.Bessent also said Washington was prepared to deliver “stand-by credit” from the Treasury’s exchange stabilization fund.Milei on Wednesday also met Kristalina Georgieva, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) with which Argentina concluded a $20 billion loan agreement in April.”Very constructive meeting,” she wrote on X afterward.”We stand with Argentina as it implements policies to safeguard stability, reduce inflation, rebuild reserves, and boost growth prospects,” she added.During his talks with Milei on Tuesday, Trump had sought to downplay his ally’s woes, promising “help” while saying: “I don’t think they need a bailout.””He, like us, inherited a mess and what he’s done to fix it is good,” Trump told reporters.- Top Democrat against ‘bailout’ -Milei’s election was cheered by investors in 2023 but he has begun to hemorrhage support after two years of biting austerity and a corruption scandal involving his sister.His party was beaten by the center-left Peronist movement in Buenos Aires provincial elections on September 7.The vote, which sent the peso into a tailspin, was seen as a litmus test for national legislative elections scheduled for October 26.Milei has accused the opposition of deliberately stoking “panic” to weaken him.The Trump administration’s plans to use Treasury funds to smooth his path to the elections raised eyebrows domestically. Senator Elizabeth Warren, the top Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, wrote a letter dated Monday to Bessent seeking further information about a potential “bailout” of Argentina.”It is deeply troubling that the president intends to use significant emergency funds to inflate the value of a foreign government’s currency and bolster its financial markets,” she said.Bessent shot back at Warren’s criticism, saying she and others “failed to act when presented with a historic opportunity to stabilize Latin America economically and geopolitically during the Obama years.”

A detainee was killed and two were wounded in a sniper attack Wednesday on a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in the Texas city of Dallas, officials said.The gunman, who opened fire “indiscriminately” on the ICE field office from the roof of a nearby building, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement.The shooter’s precise motive was still under investigation, but the FBI said he appears to have been directly targeting ICE, the agency chiefly responsible for carrying out President Donald Trump’s pledge to expel millions of undocumented migrants.”Early evidence that we’ve seen from rounds that were found near the suspected shooter contain messages that are anti-ICE in nature,” FBI special agent Joe Rothrock told a press conference.FBI Director Kash Patel published a photo on X of five unspent bullets — one of which was marked with the words “ANTI-ICE” — and denounced what he called “despicable, politically motivated attacks against law enforcement.”Trump, in a post on Truth Social, blamed the attack on “Radical Left Democrats constantly demonizing Law Enforcement, calling for ICE to be demolished, and comparing ICE Officers to ‘Nazis’.””The continuing violence from Radical Left Terrorists, in the aftermath of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, must be stopped,” he said in a reference to the conservative influencer murdered earlier this month.DHS said the shooter “fired indiscriminately at the ICE building, including at a van in the sallyport where the victims were shot.”DHS initially said two detainees were killed and a third wounded but later issued a statement saying that one detainee was killed and two critically wounded.The Mexican foreign ministry said one of those wounded is a Mexican citizen.The gunman’s name has not been released by the authorities, but multiple media reports identified him as Joshua Jahn, 29.The ICE facility where the shooting occurred processes detainees before they are transferred to a long-term detention center.Like Trump, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem also blamed the attack on rhetoric directed at ICE.”For months, we’ve been warning politicians and the media to tone down their rhetoric about ICE law enforcement before someone was killed,” Noem said. “These horrendous killings must serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric about ICE has consequences.”- Other recent attacks -There have been calls to tone down the political rhetoric from both Democrats and Republicans following Kirk’s September 10 assassination.ICE’s prominent role in the Trump immigration crackdown has sparked widespread criticism over its use of armed, masked agents to conduct raids in public places against undocumented migrants.After ICE immigration raids in Los Angeles spurred unrest and protests earlier this year, Trump dispatched the National Guard and US Marines to the California city.Another ICE facility in Texas was the target of an attack in July that left a police officer wounded in the neck.At least 10 people have been charged for their roles in the attack on the ICE center in the town of Alvarado.According to a criminal complaint, the assailants, dressed in black military-style clothing, shot fireworks at the ICE facility and spray-painted “Traitor” and “ICE Pig” on cars and a guard structure.The Alvarado incident came just days before a man armed with an assault rifle opened fire at a US Border Patrol facility in McAllen, Texas.The 27-year-old man fired dozens of rounds from an assault rifle at the entrance of the Border Patrol annex before being shot dead.Two police officers and a Border Patrol employee were injured.

US Vice President JD Vance warned Wednesday that Donald Trump was “growing incredibly impatient” with Moscow as Washington’s stance on Russia hardens after diplomatic efforts to resolve the war in Ukraine stalled.Trump performed a stunning about-turn at the UN on Tuesday, suggesting that Ukraine could not only retake all of the territory it lost to Russia militarily, but take even more. Trump “doesn’t feel like they’re putting enough on the table to end the war…If the Russians refuse to negotiate in good faith, I think it’s going to be very, very bad for their country,” Vance said in North Carolina.In a meeting earlier Wednesday in New York, top US diplomat Marco Rubio apparently clashed with his Russian counterpart, calling for the “killing to stop” and demanding Moscow “take meaningful steps toward a durable resolution.”Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov fired back and “stressed the unacceptability of the schemes promoted by Kyiv and some European capitals aimed at prolonging the conflict,” according to a readout of their conversation supplied by the Russian side.Ukrainian President Voldodymyr Zelensky praised Trump following the US president’s unexpected turn against Russia, but cautioned that NATO alone could not underwrite his country’s security.”Because international institutions are too weak, this madness continues. Even being part of the long-standing military alliance doesn’t automatically mean you are safe,” Zelensky told the UN General Assembly.Zelensky said he had a “good meeting” with Trump, who has ruled out NATO membership for Kyiv and berated the Ukrainian leader at a February encounter at the White House before warming to him.”Of course we are doing everything to make sure Europe truly helps and of course, we count on the United States,” Zelensky said.Trump’s suggestion Tuesday that Kyiv could win, with support from the European Union and NATO, marked an extraordinary shift after months of saying Ukraine would not get back swaths of territory taken by Russia.Trump said Ukraine could regain all its land and suggested, without elaborating, that Kyiv could “maybe even go further than that!”The US leader’s comments marked his latest in a series of policy switches on Ukraine, and come just weeks after hosting Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska.- Zelensky warning -Zelensky warned Wednesday that Europe could not afford to lose strategically located Moldova to Russian influence and let it follow Belarus and Georgia into Moscow’s orbit.”Russia’s trying to do to Moldova what Iran once did to Lebanon and the global response again, (is) not enough. We have already lost Georgia in Europe…and for many, many years, Belarus has also been moving toward dependence on Russia. Europe cannot afford to lose Moldova too,” he said at the UN General Assembly.Moldova, a former Soviet republic, goes to the polls on Sunday with pro-EU President Maia Sandu facing a barrage of deep-fake videos and other disinformation linked to Russia.Zelensky also sounded the alarm over the development of autonomous drones and unmanned aerial vehicles capable of shooting down other drones and targeting critical infrastructure.”We are now living through the most destructive arms race in human history, because this time it includes artificial intelligence,” he said, adding that the only real security guarantees are “friends and weapons.””If the world can’t respond even to all threats, and if there is no strong platform for international security, will there be any peace left on earth?”The wartime leader, who has a packed itinerary of meetings with world leaders while in New York for the UN’s signature diplomatic week, stressed that Ukraine had been forced to ramp up its military production.”Ukraine doesn’t have the big fat missiles dictators love to show off in parades, but we do have drones that can fly up to 2,000, 3,000 kilometers,” he said.”We had no choice but to build them to protect our right to life.”

French President Emmanuel Macron and a US envoy said Wednesday that Iran still had a last chance to avoid deep UN sanctions if it addresses concerns on its nuclear program.France, Britain and Germany have set the clock through the UN Security Council to reimpose sweeping sanctions at the end of Saturday on Iran, which they say has not cooperated on the long-running nuclear row.Macron met Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly and urged him to reverse a series of steps taken by Tehran following an Israeli and US attack in June.Iran must allow full access to UN nuclear inspectors, immediately resume nuclear negotiations and offer transparency on highly enriched uranium whose whereabouts have been the subject of speculation, Macron said.”An agreement remains possible. Only a few hours are left. It’s up to Iran to respond to the legitimate conditions we have raised,” Macron wrote on X after meeting Pezeshkian.Steve Witkoff, Trump’s real-estate friend and roving envoy who had been negotiating with Iran until Israel attacked, said without further elaboration that he was still in touch with Iran.Witkoff said that Iran was in a “tough position” ahead of the return of the so-called snapback sanctions.”I think that we have no desire to hurt them. We have a desire, however, to either realize a permanent solution and negotiate around snapbacks,” Witkoff told the Concordia summit on the sidelines of the General Assembly.”If we can’t, then snapbacks will be what they are. They’re the right medicine,” Witkoff said.Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi met Tuesday with his European counterparts, leading to no clear progress other than an agreement to keep talking.- Iran denies bomb pursuit -Ahead of meeting Macron, Pezeshkian insisted before the annual UN gathering that Iran was not at fault.”I hereby declare once more before this assembly that Iran has never sought and will never seek to build a nuclear bomb,” he said.”The one disturbing peace and stability in the region is Israel, but Iran is the one that gets punished,” he said.Iran has long contended that it is not seeking nuclear weapons, pointing to an edict by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and US intelligence has not concluded that the country has decided to build a nuclear weapon.But Israel, the United States and European countries have long been skeptical due to the country’s advanced nuclear work, believing it could quickly pursue a bomb if it so decided.The snapback sanctions would restore wide-ranging UN economic measures that had been suspended under a 2015 nuclear deal that was negotiated by former US president Barack Obama.Trump withdrew from the deal in his first term and imposed major unilateral US sanctions.Pezeshkian accused the Europeans of bad faith, saying that Iran’s lack of cooperation was in response to Trump’s withdrawal from the nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).”They falsely presented themselves as parties of good standing to the agreement, and they disparaged Iran’s sincere efforts as insufficient,” Pezeshkian said.”All of this was in pursuit of nothing less than the destruction of the very JCPOA which they themselves had once held as a foremost achievement.”Standing at the General Assembly rostrum, Pezeshkian showed pictures of people killed in the 12-day Israeli military campaign against Iran in June, which Tehran says killed more than 1,000 people.The United States joined in the campaign on June 22, striking several of Iran’s nuclear facilities.”Aerial assaults of the Zionist regime and the United States of America against Iran’s cities, homes and infrastructure at the very time we were treading the path of diplomatic negotiations constituted a grave betrayal of diplomacy,” he said.

The top US diplomat Marco Rubio issued a blunt call to his Russian counterpart to halt the “killing” in Ukraine Wednesday, as Washington’s stance on Moscow hardens.Rubio “reiterated President (Donald) Trump’s call for the killing to stop and the need for Moscow to take meaningful steps toward a durable resolution of the Russia-Ukraine war,” State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said.Lavrov fired back and “stressed the unacceptability of the schemes promoted by Kyiv and some European capitals aimed at prolonging the conflict,” according to a readout of their conversation supplied by the Russian side.Rubio’s comments came after President Volodymyr Zelensky praised Trump following the US president’s unexpected turn against Russia Tuesday, in which he suggested that Kyiv could not only win the war and re-take its territory — but could even expand it.  But the Ukrainian leader cast doubt Wednesday on NATO’s ability to guarantee Kyiv’s security.”Because international institutions are too weak, this madness continues. Even being part of the long-standing military alliance doesn’t automatically mean you are safe,” Zelensky told the UN General Assembly.Zelensky said he had a “good meeting” with Trump, who has ruled out NATO membership for Kyiv and berated the Ukrainian leader at a February encounter at the White House before warming to him.”Of course we are doing everything to make sure Europe truly helps and of course, we count on the United States,” Zelensky said.Trump’s suggestion Tuesday that Kyiv could win, with support from the European Union and NATO, marked an extraordinary shift after months of saying Ukraine would not get back swaths of territory taken by Russia.Trump said Ukraine could regain all its land and suggested, without elaborating, that Kyiv could “maybe even go further than that!”- ‘Big fat missiles’ -The US leader’s comments marked his latest in a series of policy switches on Ukraine, including a sudden pivot to peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin early this year that stunned allies.Zelensky warned Wednesday that Europe could not afford to lose strategically located Moldova to Russian influence and let it follow Belarus and Georgia into Moscow’s orbit.”Russia’s trying to do to Moldova what Iran once did to Lebanon and the global response again, (is) not enough. We have already lost Georgia in Europe… and for many, many years, Belarus has also been moving toward dependence on Russia. Europe cannot afford to lose Moldova too,” he said at the UN General Assembly.Moldova, a former Soviet republic, goes to the polls on Sunday with pro-EU President Maia Sandu facing a barrage of deepfake videos and other disinformation linked to Russia.Zelensky also sounded the alarm over the development of autonomous drones and unmanned aerial vehicles capable of shooting down other drones and targeting critical infrastructure.”We are now living through the most destructive arms race in human history, because this time it includes artificial intelligence,” he said, adding that the only real security guarantees are “friends and weapons.””If the world can’t respond even to all threats, and if there is no strong platform for international security, will there be any peace left on earth?”The wartime leader, who has a packed itinerary of meetings with world leaders while in New York for the UN’s signature diplomatic week, stressed that Ukraine had been forced to ramp up its military production.”Ukraine doesn’t have the big fat missiles dictators love to show off in parades, but we do have drones that can fly up to 2,000, 3,000 kilometers.”We had no choice but to build them to protect our right to life.”

Two detainees were killed and one wounded in a sniper attack Wednesday on a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in the Texas city of Dallas, officials said.The gunman, who opened fire “indiscriminately” on the ICE field office from the roof of a nearby building, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement.The shooter’s precise motive was still under investigation, but the FBI said he appears to have been directly targeting ICE, the agency chiefly responsible for carrying out President Donald Trump’s pledge to expel millions of undocumented migrants.”Early evidence that we’ve seen from rounds that were found near the suspected shooter contain messages that are anti-ICE in nature,” FBI special agent Joe Rothrock told a press conference.FBI Director Kash Patel published a photo on X of five unspent bullets — one of which was marked with the words “ANTI-ICE” — and denounced what he called “despicable, politically motivated attacks against law enforcement.”DHS said the shooter “fired indiscriminately at the ICE building, including at a van in the sallyport where the victims were shot.”Two detainees were killed and a third is in critical condition, it said.The ICE facility which came under attack processes detainees before they are transferred to a long-term detention center, according to US media reports.Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and Vice President JD Vance condemned rhetoric directed at ICE since Trump’s return to office.”For months, we’ve been warning politicians and the media to tone down their rhetoric about ICE law enforcement before someone was killed,” Noem said on X. “These horrendous killings must serve as a wake-up call to the far-left that their rhetoric about ICE has consequences.”- Other recent attacks -“The obsessive attack on law enforcement, particularly ICE, must stop,” Vice President JD Vance said on the social media platform.ICE’s prominent role in the Trump immigration crackdown has sparked widespread criticism over its use of armed, masked agents to conduct raids in public places against undocumented migrants.After ICE immigration raids in Los Angeles spurred unrest and protests earlier this year, Trump dispatched the National Guard and US Marines to the California city.Another ICE facility in Texas was the target of an attack in July that left a police officer wounded in the neck.Ten people have been charged for their roles in the attack on the ICE center in the town of Alvarado.According to a criminal complaint, the assailants, dressed in black military-style clothing, shot fireworks at the ICE facility and spray-painted “Traitor” and “ICE Pig” on cars and a guard structure.The Alvarado incident came just days before a man armed with an assault rifle opened fire at a US Border Patrol facility in McAllen, Texas.The 27-year-old man fired dozens of rounds from an assault rifle at the entrance of the Border Patrol annex before being shot dead.Two police officers and a Border Patrol employee were injured.

President Volodymyr Zelensky cast doubt Wednesday on NATO’s ability to guarantee Ukraine’s security but praised Donald Trump after the US president unexpectedly flip-flopped to say he thinks Russia can be defeated.Addressing the United Nations, Zelensky suggested that even NATO membership — which Trump has ruled out for Ukraine — might not be enough.”Because international institutions are too weak, this madness continues. Even being part of the long-standing military alliance doesn’t automatically mean you are safe,” he told the UN General Assembly.But Zelensky praised Trump after their meeting Tuesday.”We had a good meeting with President Trump, and I also spoke with many other strong leaders, and together, we can change a lot,” he said. “Of course we are doing everything to make sure Europe truly helps and of course, we count on the United States.”Trump’s suggestion Tuesday that Kyiv could win, with support from the European Union and NATO, marked an extraordinary shift after months of saying Ukraine would not get back swaths of territory taken by Russia.Trump said Ukraine could regain all its land and suggested, without elaborating, that Kyiv could “maybe even go further than that!”The US leader’s comments marked the latest in a series of his policy switches on Ukraine, including a sudden pivot to peace talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin early this year that stunned allies.Washington’s top diplomat Marco Rubio met with his Russian opposite number Sergei Lavrov on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York, although no details about their talks were immediately made available.- ‘Big fat missiles’ -Zelensky warned Wednesday that Europe could not afford to lose strategically located Moldova to Russian influence and let it follow Belarus and Georgia into Moscow’s orbit.”Russia’s trying to do to Moldova what Iran once did to Lebanon and the global response again, (is) not enough. We have already lost Georgia in Europe… and for many, many years, Belarus has also been moving toward dependence on Russia. Europe cannot afford to lose Moldova too,” he said at the UN General Assembly.Moldova, a former Soviet republic, goes to the polls on Sunday with pro-EU President Maia Sandu facing a barrage of deepfake videos and other disinformation linked to Russia.Zelensky also sounded the alarm over the development of autonomous drones and unmanned aerial vehicles capable of shooting down other drones and targeting critical infrastructure.”We are now living through the most destructive arms race in human history, because this time it includes artificial intelligence,” he said, adding that the only real security guarantees are “friends and weapons.””If the world can’t respond even to all threats, and if there is no strong platform for international security, will there be any peace left on earth?”The wartime leader, who has a packed itinerary of meetings with world leaders while in New York for the UN’s signature diplomatic week, stressed that Ukraine had been forced to ramp up its military production.”Ukraine doesn’t have the big fat missiles dictators love to show off in parades, but we do have drones that can fly up to 2,000, 3,000 kilometers.”We had no choice but to build them to protect our right to life.”