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Beyond putting its work in some of the world’s poorest countries in doubt, US President Donald Trump’s sudden move to shut down USAID has left many of its thousands of employees in shock and despair.Promising to slash federal spending, Trump’s government has put almost all of the more than 10,000 employees at the US Agency for International Development (USAID) on leave and promised to shut down the organization.One employee, speaking on condition of anonymity, sobbed in a conference call involving current and former USAID staff with journalists.”We’re not being treated like humans right now,” she said.”I am just bewildered that the approach has been like this,” she said. “I’m so concerned about the direction of this country.” Another worker spoke of their commitment to the cause of USAID, which operates a wide array of humanitarian and development programs around the world and is one of the primary tools of US soft power.”We literally have focused our life on this USAID mission,” she said, adding that her family had been working in the sector “for decades now.””You don’t have a home to go to. And you have a mission that you believe in and that you’ve supported for decades, and it’s just the rug’s pulled (from) under you,” she said.There is “a great deal of heartache and anger,” said one former USAID employee. – ‘Utter confusion’ -Trump and his allies allege the agency is rife with “fraud,” but have provided little proof of the accusations.USAID’s budget of more than $40 billion is mandated by Congress, with its programs ranging from governance to life-saving food assistance.The agency has, over the years, faced criticism in the aid sector for its overhead costs and questions on whether some of its programs achieve their objectives.The former USAID employee spoke of how their colleagues “dedicated their lives to serving others on behalf of the American people.””Right now, they are facing utter confusion and outright malignment from their leadership,” she said. Others spoke of the toll the uncertainty has taken on their mental health.”I have been physically sick probably for the past week, stressed, anxious, not sleeping,” one said.”We definitely all see this as sort of the tip of the iceberg for what the country is going through right now,” he added, asserting he was “more determined than ever.”Much of USAID’s staff is based abroad, and there was little clarity on what fate awaited them.A brief message on the USAID website, which informed staff they would be placed on leave and that arrangements were being made to fly overseas staff back “within 30 days” was all that they had to go on, said staff members. Case-by-case exceptions would be considered “based on personal or family hardship, mobility or safety concerns, or other reasons.” That message left many unclear on what happens next.”We are unsure if Secretary (of State Marco) Rubio and President Trump are going to abandon us overseas or abandon us when we land on American soil,” said one worker. “Our employer, the United States government, is not honoring their duty of care to us.”Each of these families are going to arrive homeless, jobless, and insuranceless within a matter of days or possibly even hours of stepping foot on American soil,” she concluded.- ‘Catastrophic’ -Beyond their own disrupted lives, staff said they were alarmed at the consequences on USAID’s massive portfolio of projects, some of them in the world’s poorest countries. “There are real life consequences happening right now because of this chaos,” said one worker, calling the Trump administration’s claim that waivers were in place for life-saving assistance a “sham.””This is resulting in massive humanitarian consequences everywhere for refugees globally who rely on our food assistance to stay alive when they have no means for their own livelihoods,” said another. They pointed to aid programs for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, where full rations of food assistance for one million refugees were due to run out at the end of the month.Provisions would end completely by April, they said.”For Sudanese refugees, what is happening is that organizations are already saying, sorry, you can’t get your food assistance this month,” said one worker, adding that water and sanitation services to 1.6 million people were also being cut.”This is going to affect all of us. It is. The ripple effects are going to be catastrophic everywhere.”

The Republican-controlled US Senate was expected Thursday to approve vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary, despite major concerns from both political parties and many in the medical and scientific communities.Kennedy squeaked through a crucial preliminary vote last week by the Senate Finance Committee, setting up the vote by the full upper chamber, which is controlled by US President Trump’s Republicans.The 71-year-old nephew of the assassinated president John F. Kennedy is expected to win approval as Republicans yet again back Trump and his latest cabinet pick. The vote is expected around 10:30 am (1530 GMT).An environmental lawyer by trade with no medical background, Kennedy has spent years professing conspiracy theories linking vaccines and autism, and most recently spread misinformation about Covid-19 vaccines.His nomination has faced vocal opposition from both parties, with Republicans particularly eying his past support for abortion, his record suing big business and his 2023 run for president as a Democrat.Nine months ago, Trump was calling Kennedy “one of the most Liberal Lunatics ever to run for office.”Beyond vaccines, Democrats point mainly to sexual misconduct allegations, Kennedy’s suggestion that Covid-19 was designed to spare Jews, his linking of school shootings to anti-depressants and bizarre incidents involving dead animals.Last year 77 Nobel prize winners sent an open letter to the Senate opposing his nomination and warning he could place the public’s health “in jeopardy.””He’s a frightening man, (a) dangerous man, and I think he’ll do harm,” said Paul Offit, head of the Vaccine Education Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.Critics accuse Republicans of being negligent.”They are looking the other way. They are choosing to pretend like it is in any way believable that RFK Jr. won’t use his new power to do exactly the thing he has been trying to do for decades — undermine vaccines,” said Democratic Senator Patty Murray.The Republican-controlled Senate has so far approved all of Trump’s cabinet nominations over howls of protest from Democrats who have attacked the candidates’ lack of experience and, in some cases, questioned their patriotism. On Wednesday it gave the green light to Tulsi Gabbard as Trump’s choice to lead the intelligence services, despite criticism over her inexperience and past support for US adversaries Russia and Syria.Gabbard’s success was seen as another powerful demonstration of Trump’s iron grip on his party, after he pushed through a slate of some of the most contentious cabinet nominees in modern history.The president proposed a defense secretary accused of sexual assault, an attorney general suspected of trafficking a minor for sex, and an FBI chief alleged to be motivated by political revenge. All were also widely criticized for their lack of experience.Only the suspected sex trafficker — former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz — has so far been rejected by the Senate.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will try to rekindle his bromance with Donald Trump — and avoid the US president’s wrath on tariffs and immigration — when they meet on Thursday at the White House.Modi will also hold a joint press conference with Trump, the White House said — a rare move from the Indian leader, who is a prolific social media user but seldom takes questions from reporters.The latest in a series of foreign leaders beating an early path to the Oval Office door since the Republican’s return to power, Modi shared good relations with Trump during his first term.The premier has offered quick tariff concessions ahead of his visit, with New Delhi slashing duties on high-end motorcycles — a boost to Harley-Davidson, the iconic American manufacturer whose struggles in India have irked Trump.India also accepted a US military flight carrying 100 shackled migrants last week as part of Trump’s immigration overhaul, and New Delhi has vowed its own “strong crackdown” on illegal migration.India’s top career diplomat Vikram Misri said last week that there had been a “very close rapport” between the leaders, although their ties have so far failed to bring a breakthrough on a long-sought bilateral trade deal.Modi was among the first to congratulate “good friend” Trump after his November election win.For nearly three decades, US presidents from both parties have prioritized building ties with India, seeing a natural partner against a rising China.But Trump has also raged against India over trade, the biggest foreign policy preoccupation of his new term, in the past calling the world’s fifth-largest economy the “biggest tariff abuser.”Former property tycoon Trump has unapologetically weaponized tariffs against friends and foes since his return.- ‘Trump’s anger’ -Modi “has prepared for this, and he is seeking to preempt Trump’s anger,” said Lisa Curtis, the National Security Council director on South Asia during Trump’s first term.The Indian premier’s Hindu-nationalist government has meanwhile obliged Trump on another top priority: deporting undocumented immigrants.While public attention has focused on Latin American arrivals, India is the third source of undocumented immigrants in the United States after Mexico and El Salvador.Indian activists burned an effigy of Trump last week after the migrants on the US plane were flown back in shackles the whole journey, while the opposition accused Modi of weakness.One thing Modi is likely to avoid, however, is any focus on his record on the rights of Muslims and other minorities.Trump is unlikely to highlight an issue on which former president Joe Biden’s administration offered gentle critiques.Modi is the fourth world leader to visit Trump since his return, following the prime ministers of Israel and Japan and the king of Jordan.Modi assiduously courted Trump during his first term. The two share much in common, with both campaigning on promises to promote the interests of their countries’ majority communities over minorities and both doggedly pursuing critics.In February 2020, Modi invited Trump before a cheering crowd of more than 100,000 people to inaugurate the world’s largest cricket stadium in his home state of Gujarat.Trump could visit India later this year for a scheduled summit of the Quad — a four-way grouping of Australia, India, Japan and the United States.

For the first time in nearly two years of war, soup kitchens in famine-stricken Sudan are being forced to turn people away, with US President Donald Trump’s aid freeze gutting the life-saving schemes.”People will die because of these decisions,” said a Sudanese fundraising volunteer, who has been scrambling to find money to feed tens of thousands of people in the capital Khartoum.”We have 40 kitchens across the country feeding between 30,000 to 35,000 people every day,” another Sudanese volunteer told AFP, saying all of them had closed after Trump announced the freezing of foreign assistance and the dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).”Women and children are being turned away and we can’t promise them when we can feed them again,” she said, requesting anonymity for fear that speaking publicly could jeopardise her work.Since April 2023, Sudan has been torn apart by a war between its regular army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.In addition to killing tens of thousands of people and uprooting over 12 million, the war has pushed five areas of the country into famine and nearly 25 million people into acute food insecurity.In much of Sudan, community-run soup kitchens are the only thing preventing mass starvation and many of them rely on US funding.”The impact of the decision to withdraw funding in this abrupt manner has life-ending consequences,” Javid Abdelmoneim, medical team leader at Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Khartoum’s twin city of Omdurman, told AFP.”This is yet another disaster for people in Sudan, already suffering the consequences of violence, hunger, a collapse of the healthcare system and a woeful international humanitarian response,” he added.- ‘People are dying’ -Shortly after his inauguration last month, Trump froze US foreign aid and announced the dismantling of USAID.His administration then issued waivers for “life-saving humanitarian assistance”, but there have so far been no signs of this taking effect in Sudan and aid workers said their efforts were already crippled.In what the United Nations has decried as a global “state of confusion”, agencies on the ground in Sudan have been forced to halt essential food, shelter and health operations.”All official communications have gone dark,” another Sudanese aid coordinator told AFP, after USAID workers were put on leave this week.The kitchens that have survived “are stretching resources and sharing as much as they can”, he said.”But there’s just not enough to go around.”As one of the few independent organisations still standing in Sudan, MSF said it had been fielding requests from local responders to quickly step in.However, “MSF can’t fill the gap left by the US funding withdrawal,” Abdelmoneim said.The United States was the largest single donor to Sudan last year, contributing $800 million or around 46 percent of funds to the UN’s response plan.The UN estimates it currently has less than 6 percent of the humanitarian funding needed for Sudan in 2025.Over 8 million people are on the brink of famine in Sudan, according to the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification.Famine is expected to spread to at least five more areas of Sudan by May, before the upcoming rainy season is likely to make access to food all the more difficult across the country.- Money running out -The hunger crisis is already much worse than figures show, according to the UN, with a lack of access to data preventing official famine declarations including in Khartoum.Now, the situation is likely to deteriorate further.In tandem with Trump’s decisions, the US-funded early warning system for famines, FEWS Net, has also gone offline. That has raised fears that simply tracking the rapidly worsening famine in Sudan will be made harder.”What’s most devastating is that so much was promised,” the aid coordinator said.According to several volunteers, aid agencies had already distributed millions of dollars worth of food, healthcare and shelter assistance — based on US funding pledges — when Trump cut operations.”That means that some local response is already paid for, for now,” the coordinator continued.”The fear is what’s coming next. They have the money now, but what about next month? How many will go hungry then?”Across the country, volunteers in soup kitchens are burning through their last few weeks of funding — terrified of what will happen when it runs out.”It was already not enough, but at least people were getting something,” the soup kitchen fundraiser told AFP.”Now things are going from bad to worse. People are malnourished, pregnant women are dying for lack of healthcare, there’s no semblance of life anymore.”

Young engineers deployed across the US government as part of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have triggered alarm throughout Washington’s security establishment. Never before has a group of unvetted and inexperienced outsiders gained such access to the nerve center of the US government, according to security experts.The campaign, led by Musk’s DOGE team, began at the Treasury Department when they took control of the US government’s payment system — a move justified as monitoring public spending. From there, it expanded into an unprecedented cost-cutting initiative, with software engineers spreading across federal agencies, taking control of computer systems.They have disrupted and in some cases effectively shuttered organizations such the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Department of Education, and the General Services Administration (GSA), which manages much of the government’s infrastructure and building portfolio.”In the span of just weeks, the US government has experienced what may be the most consequential security breach in its history,” wrote Bruce Schneier, a security technologist at the Harvard Kennedy School, and Davi Ottenheimer of Inrupt, a data infrastructure company, in Foreign Policy.The situation is particularly critical at the Bureau of Fiscal Services, the Treasury unit managing all federal payments -— a crucial chokepoint of the US economy. An internal report by an outside contractor warned that the access given to the DOGE team “poses the single greatest insider threat risk the Bureau has ever faced.”The computer systems in question rank among the world’s most complex and sensitive. Yet DOGE is staffed primarily with individuals connected to Musk’s companies and young tech professionals in their 20s -— virtually none of whom have been vetted, or have government experience. As for Musk himself — who is unelected — there are concerns about his conflicts of interest, as his companies hold several major government contracts, and whether access to sensitive data will give his business empire an even greater advantage.Meanwhile, senior government workers with decades of system expertise have been blocked from buildings and sidelined by DOGE teams, raising concerns among those who understand the intricate vulnerabilities of government technology.The consequences are already emerging. At the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s HR department, reports indicate DOGE-associated individuals connected an unauthorized server to the network and are using AI software on US citizens’ personal data — in violation of federal privacy laws.The blitz on government has sparked numerous lawsuits, forcing some retreat from DOGE, with a Trump official on Wednesday acknowledging to a judge that a staffer should not have had full system access.In another security slip-up, according to The New York Times, the CIA sent an unclassified email listing all employees hired by the spy agency over the last two years to comply with cost-cutting efforts spearheaded by DOGE.- Too much power -Security experts Schneier and Ottenheimer are especially troubled by the removal of career officials who managed security measures. “The Treasury’s computer systems have such an impact on national security that they were designed with the same principle that guides nuclear launch protocols: No single person should have unlimited power,” they wrote. Making changes to critical financial systems “traditionally requires multiple authorized personnel working in concert,” they said.Musk, who frequently posts on the social platform he owns, X, dismisses government workers as either inept or politically compromised — a “deep state” aligned with Democrats and opposed to Trump. The risk of mistakes has alarmed cybersecurity experts, including Michael Daniel, former White House cybersecurity coordinator under Barack Obama and current head of the Cyber Threat Alliance.”The Chinese, the Russians, other intelligence services -– they put their A-teams on projects that target the US government, and they will exploit any opportunity they have,” Daniel warned. “This assumption that obviously everybody that works for the federal government is stupid and incompetent, and it’s so simple that it doesn’t even matter who you put on the job… that’s just incorrect.” “With government systems, things are not necessarily obvious on the surface. And it takes experience to understand what some of those issues are.”Meanwhile, security experts note that China and Russia, which have long targeted these sensitive systems, could weaponize mistakes and vulnerabilities made in one afternoon for years to come.If “cybersecurity is not top of mind in every step of the integration, you potentially open the door for foreign intelligence services and sophisticated cyber criminals to find a way through,” Eric O’Neill, former FBI operative and strategist for cybersecurity specialty firm NeXasure, told AFP.

New York, Paris and Berlin are celebrating the anniversaries this year of iconic art installations that saw some of their most prominent landmarks wrapped in fabric by the late artists known as Christo and Jeanne-Claude.Forty years ago the couple enfolded the Pont Neuf, one of Paris’s most beloved bridges, in a silky, sandstone-colored material for “The Pont Neuf Wrapped.”Ten years later, in 1995, came “Wrapped Reichstag,” when they swathed the parliament building in Berlin with a shiny, aluminum-like material.And ten years after that was “The Gates” in New York’s Central Park, which saw miles of steel gates hung with saffron-colored nylon fabric. The giant works are long gone. But the three cities will hold exhibits marking their anniversaries — as well as what would have been both Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s 90th birthdays — this year.Bulgarian-born Christo — full name Christo Vladimirov Javacheff — died in 2020, 11 years after his French wife Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon passed away.The artists were only interested in seeing the projects once they were done and “when they see it, for them, two weeks is enough,” said their nephew Vladimir Yavachev.He recalled a quote from then New York mayor Michael Bloomberg about “The Gates”: “If you hate it, it’s temporary. If you love it, it’s still temporary.”Yavachev, who is seeking to complete unfinished works by the couple involving the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and a sculpture in the desert in Abu Dhabi, said it was “just a coincidence” that many of their projects happened in years ending with a “five.”He spoke from couple’s art studio in the Soho district of New York, which — unlike the mammoth installations they are remembered for — endures.In the workshop models for the unfinished jobs in Paris and Abu Dhabi sit on tables and are displayed on the walls.Boxes of paint and pencils and work tables also fill this workshop on the fifth floor of an old building where the artists arrived in 1964.Other artifacts include an old radio to listen to during long sessions of creativity, a black telephone that looks utterly prehistoric, and samples of fabric of the kind used to wrap entire buildings.It all looks ready to use, like the artists are going to show up again any minute.

A Houston poultry supply company is selling chickens like there is no tomorrow, as sky-high prices for eggs prompt some Americans to produce their own at home.A recent US outbreak of bird flu since early 2024 is exacting a heavy toll on poultry farms. More than 21 million egg-laying hens have been “depopulated” this year so far, after 13.2 million were culled in December, according to the US Department of Agriculture.Eggs, as a result, are a precious commodity these days.John Berry, who manages a livestock company in Houston, reported a dramatic increase in demand for chickens as consumers grapple with the egg shortage.  “Our sales for poultry have doubled or maybe potentially tripled. I mean we’re selling 100 chickens a week or more,” Berry told AFP.In times of egg abundance it would take two or three weeks to sell that many birds, he said.A dozen premium eggs can now cost an eye-popping $10 in some US supermarkets, with even lower-grade ones now drawing twice their usual price of what is normally between two and three dollars.The popular grocery store chain Trader Joe’s is limiting purchases to one dozen eggs of any kind per household per day, and Costco is also limiting purchases. Waffle House restaurants have slapped a 50-cent surcharge on each egg in a dish to compensate for higher costs.Last week in Seattle, a restaurant was robbed of 500 eggs from its storeroom in the middle of the night.- ‘ I have a large family’ -Berry said most of his chicken buyers are new to the world of egg production.Such is the case of Arturo Becerra, who recently bought 10 hens for $400, with another $20 for a month’s worth of feed.On Monday, he bought five more hens, and plans to get another 10, “because I have a large family.” His hens are still young and need a few more weeks to start laying eggs.Some cities and towns in Texas allow people to raise chickens at home if they follow certain health norms.The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say the risk to the general public from avian flu remains “low,” but has released safety guidelines for owners of backyard bird flocks. The CDC also says that “people with job-related or recreational exposures to birds or other H5 virus-infected animals, are at greater risk of infection.”That has not appeared to deter Becerra. “Now I have some place to put them, and besides, eggs are very expensive,” said Becerra, a 57-year-old man who was born in Mexico. “I think it will be cheaper to buy hens and raise them.”Billy Underhill, the 62-year-old owner of a construction company and longtime chicken raiser, has bought two more of the clucking creatures.”I just heard someone yesterday say that eggs were, like, 10 dollars a dozen,” he said.”I was already planning on buying a couple more chickens. I buy a couple every couple months because some of them die. Eventually they die and they stop laying so I’m going to keep the flow of eggs going in my family,” he said.Berry said there are no chickens to replace the millions that had to be killed because of avian influenza.”You have to have had anticipated this and raised a thousand extra chickens or a million extra chickens,” said Berry.In the United States, the disease is affecting not just poultry farms but also dairy cows.  There have been 68 cases among people since early last year, with one of them fatal. Most of them were among people coming into contact with infected animals, according to the CDC. The man who died was infected “after exposure to a combination of a non-commercial backyard flock and wild birds,” health authorities said.Berry said there is a generation of chickens growing and waiting to replace the ones who were destroyed. But it will take time, and as eggs store well, he recommends that people stock up.”It’ll be a couple of months, I would guess at the soonest. Seems like it’s two or three months or more before things kind of get right.”

A US judge on Wednesday lifted his freeze on a buyout plan offered to federal workers, handing President Donald Trump a victory in his efforts to drastically slash the government workforce.US District Judge George O’Toole, who had temporarily paused the plan last week, lifted his restraining order on the mass buyout offer.Labor unions representing federal employees had filed suit to block the scheme masterminded by billionaire Elon Musk to slash the size of the US government by encouraging federal workers to quit.In an email titled “Fork in the Road,”  the more than two million US government employees were given an offer to leave with eight months’ pay or risk being fired in future culls.The White House says more than 65,000 federal employees have signed on to the buyout offer from the Office of Personnel Management.O’Toole, an appointee of president Bill Clinton, said the unions lacked the standing to bring the suit and his court did not have jurisdiction over the matter. “The unions do not have the required direct stake in the Fork Directive, but are challenging a policy that affects others, specifically executive branch employees,” he said.The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), which represents 800,000 federal workers and was among the unions that brought the suit, called the ruling “a setback in the fight for dignity and fairness for public servants.” “But it’s not the end of that fight,” AFGE national president Everett Kelley said in a statement. “Importantly, this decision did not address the underlying lawfulness of the program. “We continue to maintain it is illegal to force American citizens who have dedicated their careers to public service to make a decision, in a few short days, without adequate information, about whether to uproot their families and leave their careers for what amounts to an unfunded IOU from Elon Musk,” Kelley said.- ‘Abusing their power’ -Musk, the world’s richest person and Trump’s biggest donor, is in charge of a free-ranging entity called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) that aims to cut hundreds of billions of dollars in government spending.His plans have effectively shuttered some federal agencies, sent thousands of staff members home and sparked legal battles across the country.Trump’s executive actions have been challenged in dozens of court cases and the White House accused judges on Wednesday of “abusing their power” to block the president’s moves.”The real constitutional crisis is taking place within our judicial branch, where district court judges in liberal districts across the country are abusing their power to unilaterally block President Trump’s basic executive authority,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said.The decisions have come from judges nominated by both Republican and Democratic presidents, including Trump himself during his first term.But Leavitt accused the judges of “acting as judicial activists rather than honest arbiters of the law.”She had asserted that “77 million Americans voted to elect this president, and each injunction is an abuse of the rule of law and an attempt to thwart the will of the people.” She later celebrated the lifted freeze, calling it “the first of many legal wins for the President.”Attorney General Pam Bondi, at her first press conference on Wednesday, described Musk as a “great man” and said “we are going to back up Elon Musk every way we can.”Asked whether the Trump administration would seek to impeach federal judges, Bondi said “that’s not going to happen now.””We’re going to look at everything,” she said. “We’re going to follow the law right now. We’re going to follow the process.”These are federal judges with lifetime appointments,” she noted, “but they will be struck down ultimately by the Supreme Court of the United States if the appellate courts don’t follow the law as well.”

US officials said Wednesday they had secured the release of three “hostages” who had been detained in Belarus, including an American citizen, in a diplomatic success for President Donald Trump’s administration.White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the release of the three, including “one American and two individuals from Belarus, one of whom worked for Radio Liberty.”US Ambassador to Lithuania Kara McDonald, speaking on CNN from Vilnius, described the release as “a big day for team America, for the president, for the secretary of state,” adding “we just welcomed them (the detainees) here a few minutes ago.”Exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya hailed the “wonderful news” in a post on X, thanking Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio “for their joint efforts in making this happen.”Chris Smith, the deputy assistant secretary of state for Eastern European affairs, described a “special operation” in which he and other US officials “crossed into the Belarusian frontier (and) went into Minsk to meet with Belarusian counterparts who brought these three detainees to us.””They were handed over to us, and we brought them back out through Lithuania,” he told CNN.The released American has not been identified.The White House’s Leavitt called the US citizen’s release “a remarkable victory on the heels of Marc Fogel returning to America last night.”Fogel, an American teacher held in Russia since 2021, was freed Tuesday in a prisoner swap with Moscow.One of the persons freed by Minsk is Andrey Kuznechyk, a veteran journalist with Radio Liberty, according to a statement from the broadcaster which is known in Belarus as Radio Svaboda.- ‘Joyous day’ -US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called the two Belarusian detainees “political prisoners” and thanked the Lithuanian government for its its assistance in the matter, calling it “a true ally and friend.” He also did not name the released American.”We remain committed to the release of other US citizens in Belarus and elsewhere,” Rubio staid in a statement. “We call for the release of nearly 1,300 political prisoners who remain in jail across Belarus.”In a statement, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) President Stephen Capus said: “This is a joyous day for Andrey, his wife, and their two young children. After more than three years apart, this family is together again thanks to President Trump.”RFE/RL posted a video of Kuznechyk hugging his wife, still wearing a prison uniform.Founded during the Cold War, RFE/RL is a broadcaster funded by the US Congress to transmit information behind the Iron Curtain.Kuznechyk was arrested in 2021, and in 2022 was sentenced to six years in a hard labor camp on charges of participating in or organizing an “extremist organization,” the broadcaster said.On Sunday, billionaire Elon Musk, who is spearheading Trump’s federal government cost-cutting efforts, called for RFE/RL and another broadcaster funded by Congress, the Voice of America, to be shuttered.Tikhanovskaya wrote on X that the other Belarusian citizen released, activist Yelena Movshuk, is “in a serious health condition.”Movshuk was detained in 2020 and in 2021 sentenced to six years on a charge of taking part in mass riots.Tikhanovskaya’s aide Franak Viachorka wrote on Facebook that Movshuk “is in a difficult physical and psychological condition.””We drove her to a safe place. On the way she told of all the horrors that she had to go through,” he added.

US President Donald Trump’s administration filed a lawsuit against New York on Wednesday accusing the Democratic-ruled state of hindering federal efforts to crack down on undocumented migrants.The legal action comes a week after the Justice Department sued so-called “sanctuary” city Chicago and the Midwestern state of Illinois on similar grounds.”We sued Illinois and New York didn’t listen,” US Attorney General Pam Bondi said at a press conference. “New York has chosen to prioritize illegal aliens over American citizens. It stops today.”If you don’t comply with federal law we will hold you accountable,” Bondi said. “And if you are a state not complying with federal law, you’re next.”Trump pledged during his 2024 presidential campaign to carry out the largest mass deportation of undocumented migrants in US history.Bondi complained that law enforcement officers in New York are not allowed, for example, to check the residency status of motorists who they pull over for traffic violations.”If (they) pull over someone and don’t have access to their background, they have no idea who they’re dealing with,” she said.New York’s Department of Motor Vehicles also has a “tipoff provision” to “inform any illegal alien when a federal immigration agency has requested their information,” Bondi said.”It’s unconstitutional, and that’s why we filed this lawsuit,” she said.Bondi was accompanied at the press conference by a woman whose 20-year-old daughter was murdered by a member of the MS-13 gang who the attorney general said should not have been allowed into the country.”No other parents should suffer by having their child murdered by somebody that shouldn’t be here,” Bondi said. “Millions of illegal aliens with violent records have flooded into our communities, bringing violence and deadly drugs with them.”Trump has insisted that undocumented migrants are disproportionately responsible for crime, despite research showing US citizens commit more offenses per capita.After taking office, Trump declared a “national emergency” on the southern US border and signed an executive order stating that undocumented migrants present “significant threats to national security and public safety.””Further exacerbating this national crisis, some of these aliens find safe havens from federal law enforcement detection in so-called Sanctuary Cities where they live and work among innocent Americans, who may later become their crime victims,” it says.Trump has long promised legal action against sanctuary states and cities, which are largely led by Democrats.