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No indications employees from defense secretary’s office are being investigated for Israel leak, Pentagon chief says

No indications employees from defense secretary’s office are being investigated for Israel leak, Pentagon chief says
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin Austin says he did not have any indication that “any OSD official will be implicated as a part of this.” (File/AFP)
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Updated 23 October 2024

No indications employees from defense secretary’s office are being investigated for Israel leak, Pentagon chief says

No indications employees from defense secretary’s office are being investigated for Israel leak, Pentagon chief says
  • Social media posts, without evidence, have singled out a US Defense Department employee as being under investigation for the leak

ROME: There are no indications any employees from the Office of the Secretary of Defense are being investigated for the leak of US intelligence about Israel’s preparations to strike Iran, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Wednesday.
“There’s no OSD official being named as a part of this investigation,” Austin said while speaking to reporters in Rome.
The FBI said on Tuesday it was investigating the public disclosure of a pair of highly classified documents describing Israel’s preparations for a retaliatory strike on Iran.
Austin added that he did not have any indication that “any OSD official will be implicated as a part of this.”
Social media posts, without evidence, have singled out a US Defense Department employee as being under investigation for the leak.
The leaked documents appear to have been prepared by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, describing US interpretations of Israeli Air Force and Navy planning based on satellite imagery from Oct. 15-16. They began circulating last week on the Telegram messaging app.
Israel has been planning a response to a ballistic-missile barrage carried out by Iran on Oct. 1, Tehran’s second direct attack on Israel in six months. Israel has intensified its offensive in Gaza and Lebanon, days after the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.
White House spokesman John Kirby said on Monday that it has not been determined whether the disclosure was a hack or an intentional leak by a US person with access to the sensitive intelligence.


Indonesia leader offers 20,000 troops for post-war Gaza

Indonesia leader offers 20,000 troops for post-war Gaza
Updated 20 sec ago

Indonesia leader offers 20,000 troops for post-war Gaza

Indonesia leader offers 20,000 troops for post-war Gaza
  • France and Ƶ, in a resolution adopted by the vast majority of the General Assembly, called for a temporary international mission to stabilize Gaza as part of a ceasefire

THE UNITED NATIONS, United States: Indonesia’s leader on Tuesday offered to send at least 20,000 troops as peacekeepers to Gaza to safeguard any future peace deal.
Addressing the UN General Assembly, President Prabowo Subianto said that the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country wanted a peace that shows that “might cannot make right.”
“We believe in the UN. We will continue to serve where peace needs guardians — not with just words, but with boots on the ground,” he said.
“If and when the UN Security Council and this great Assembly decide, Indonesia is prepared to deploy 20,000 or even more of our sons and daughters to help secure peace in Gaza,” he said.
He said that Indonesia was also willing to send peacekeepers elsewhere including in Ukraine, Sudan or Libya.
The United States and Arab states have been speaking for months, but to little avail, about a post-war plan in Gaza which has been devastated by two years of Israeli attacks in response to an assault by Hamas.
Israel has repeatedly demanded the destruction of Hamas. Its latest offensive seeks to take over the largest urban center of Gaza City, but previous proposals have called for foreign powers to take over the territory’s security.
France and Ƶ, in a resolution adopted by the vast majority of the General Assembly, called for a temporary international mission to stabilize Gaza as part of a ceasefire.

 


Key French-Lebanese accuser in Sarkozy Libya cases dies on eve of verdict: lawyer

Key French-Lebanese accuser in Sarkozy Libya cases dies on eve of verdict: lawyer
Updated 7 min 40 sec ago

Key French-Lebanese accuser in Sarkozy Libya cases dies on eve of verdict: lawyer

Key French-Lebanese accuser in Sarkozy Libya cases dies on eve of verdict: lawyer
  • Both Sarkozy and his wife, the singer and model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, have been charged on suspicion of putting pressure on a witness over these allegations in what is now a new legal case
  • Sarkozy, who was president from 2007-2012 and has been convicted twice in other cases, denies the charges

PARIS: Franco-Lebanese businessman Ziad Takieddine, a key accuser of former president Nicolas Sarkozy in the case over alleged illegal campaign financing from late Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi, died Tuesday aged 75, two days before the verdict in the ex-head of state’s trial, his lawyer said.
Takieddine died in the morning in the Lebanese capital Beirut, his French lawyer Elize Arfi told AFP.
Takieddine, a key figure in the case, had claimed several times that he helped deliver up to five million euros ($6 million)in cash from Qaddafi to Sarkozy and the former president’s chief of staff in 2006 and 2007.

Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy attends a ceremony in tribute to late policewoman Aurelie Fouquet, killed during a robbery attempt followed by a deadly chase in 2010, in Villiers-sur-Marne, on the outskirts of Paris, on May 20, 2025. (AFP)

But in 2020, Takieddine suddenly retracted his incriminating statement, prompting accusations that Sarkozy and close allies paid the witness to change his mind, something they have always denied.
Both Sarkozy and his wife, the singer and model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, have been charged on suspicion of putting pressure on a witness over these allegations in what is now a new legal case.
In the Libya investigation, prosecutors argued that the former conservative leader and his aides devised a pact with Qaddafi in 2005 to illegally fund Sarkozy’s victorious presidential election bid two years later.
Sarkozy, who was president from 2007-2012 and has been convicted twice in other cases, denies the charges.
Prosecutors have demanded a seven-year jail term for Sarkozy when the court delivers its verdict on Thursday.
Takieddine, had himself been targeted by an arrest warrant in the Libya case and had been convicted in another graft case in France. Sarkozy had always rubbished his claims calling him a “great manipulator.”

 


EU chief says discussed Russia’s airspace ‘provocations’ with Trump

EU chief says discussed Russia’s airspace ‘provocations’ with Trump
Updated 5 min 57 sec ago

EU chief says discussed Russia’s airspace ‘provocations’ with Trump

EU chief says discussed Russia’s airspace ‘provocations’ with Trump
  • EU chief and Trump agreed on the need to cut Moscow’s energy revenues

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen said Tuesday she discussed Russia’s repeated airspace violations with US President Donald Trump, and agreed on the need to cut Moscow’s energy revenues.
The European Commission president said she and Trump “addressed the Kremlin’s provocations, including regular incursions into European airspace” on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.
Von der Leyen also said the two “agreed on the need to cut Russia’s revenues from fossil fuels, and fast” to pressure Moscow over the war in Ukraine, pointing to plans announced by the EU to speed up efforts to end all its purchases.


Trump’s mixed record of ending wars

Trump’s mixed record of ending wars
Updated 20 min 31 sec ago

Trump’s mixed record of ending wars

Trump’s mixed record of ending wars
  • “In a period of just seven months, I have ended seven unendable wars,” Trump said

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump has repeatedly said he ended seven wars since returning to the White House earlier this year, making the inaccurate claim again during a Tuesday speech at the UN General Assembly.
“In a period of just seven months, I have ended seven unendable wars,” Trump said.
Below, AFP examines the US president’s mixed record on the conflicts between the seven pairs of countries he named in his UN speech.

- Cambodia and Thailand -

Five days of hostilities between Cambodia and Thailand left dozens dead in July after a territorial dispute boiled over into cross-border combat.
A truce began after phone calls from Trump, as well as mediation from Malaysia’s prime minister — chair of the ASEAN regional bloc — and a delegation of Chinese negotiators.
Cambodia’s prime minister subsequently said he nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, crediting the US president with “visionary and innovative diplomacy.”

- Kosovo and Serbia -

Serbia and Kosovo have not signed a final peace treaty, and NATO-led peacekeeping forces have been stationed in the latter area since the end of the 1998-1999 war between ethnic Albanian guerillas and Serbian forces.
Kosovo declared independence in 2008 — a move that Belgrade has not recognized.
While Trump did not forge a peace between Kosovo and Serbia, his administration did broker an economic normalization agreement between them during his first term.

- Congo and Rwanda -

Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo signed a peace accord in late June, but intense clashes between Rwandan-backed anti-government M23 fighters and Congolese forces have taken place in the eastern part of the country despite the agreement, which Trump took credit for at the time.
The M23 and the Congolese army accused each other in weekend statements of “trampling” on peace efforts or “violating” the accord’s principles.

- Pakistan and India -

India and Pakistan fought an intense four-day conflict in May that left more than 70 people dead on both sides before Trump announced a ceasefire between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
But Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in late July that no world leader had pushed his country to stop fighting Pakistan, without specifically naming Trump.
The government of Pakistan, however, has said it would recommend Trump for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize “in recognition of his decisive diplomatic intervention and pivotal leadership” during the conflict.

- Israel and Iran -

Israel launched an unprecedented 12-day air campaign targeting Iranian nuclear sites, scientists and top military brass in June in a bid to end the country’s nuclear program — an effort later joined by Washington’s forces, which carried out strikes on three nuclear sites as well.
Trump announced a ceasefire between Israel and Iran — which he later accused both countries of violating.
He worked to maintain it, seeking to turn around Israeli planes that were in the air, while the Israeli premier’s office said the country had “refrained from further strikes” after a call from Trump.

- Egypt and Ethiopia -

Tensions between Ethiopia and its downstream neighbor Egypt are heightened over the former country’s inauguration of a massive dam earlier this month.
Egypt, dependent on the Nile for 97 percent of its water, has long decried the project, with President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi calling it an “existential threat” to the country’s water security.
During his first term in office, Trump publicly mused that Egypt could bomb the dam — leading Ethiopia to accuse the then US leader of trying to provoke a war.
Trump has demanded credit for “keeping peace” between Egypt and Ethiopia, but he has not ended a war between them.

- Armenia and Azerbaijan -

Armenia and Azerbaijan have feuded for decades over their border and the status of ethnic enclaves within each other’s territories, and went to war twice over the disputed Karabakh region, which Azerbaijan recaptured from Armenian forces in 2023.
Both Armenia and Azerbaijan have praised US efforts to settle the conflict, and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has said he would back Trump’s nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize.

- Other conflicts -

Trump’s efforts to broker a peace in Gaza have been unsuccessful and he has singularly failed to end the conflict in Ukraine — a war he had boasted he could resolve in a single day once he became president.

 


If Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize, he should stop Gaza war, Macron says

If Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize, he should stop Gaza war, Macron says
Updated 15 min 26 sec ago

If Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize, he should stop Gaza war, Macron says

If Trump wants Nobel Peace Prize, he should stop Gaza war, Macron says
  • Macron said that only Trump has the power to put pressure on Israel to end the war
  • Trump at the UN rejected moves by Western allies to endorse a Palestinian state

If US President Donald Trump really wants to win the Nobel Peace Prize, he needs to stop the war in Gaza, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Tuesday.
Speaking to France’s BFM TV from New York, Macron said that only Trump has the power to put pressure on Israel to end the war.
“There is one person who can do something about it, and that is the US president. And the reason he can do more than us, is because we do not supply weapons that allow the war in Gaza to be waged. We do not supply equipment that allows war to be waged in Gaza. The United States of America does,” Macron said.
Trump on Tuesday gave a combative, wide-ranging speech to the United Nations General Assembly that rejected moves by Western allies to endorse a Palestinian state, saying that would be a reward for Hamas militants.
“We have to stop the war in Gaza immediately. We have to immediately negotiate peace,” Trump said.
Discussing Trump’s speech, Macron said: “I see an American president who is involved, who reiterated this morning from the podium: ‘I want peace. I have resolved seven conflicts’, who wants the Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel Peace Prize is only possible if you stop this conflict,” Macron said.
Several countries, including Israel, Pakistan and Cambodia, have nominated Trump for the annual prize for brokering peace agreements or ceasefires. Trump himself has said he deserves the Norwegian-bestowed accolade that four White House predecessors received.