Zelensky says nothing will weaken Kyiv’s resolve against Russia
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a speech released on Sunday that nothing would weaken his country’s fight against Russia, a day after the US Congress passed a stopgap funding bill that omitted aid to Ukraine.
Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said separately he had received reassurances about further military assistance in a telephone call with US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
“Secretary Austin assured me,” he wrote in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, using flags in place of country names, that US support to Ukraine “will continue” and that Ukrainian “warriors will continue to have a strong back-up on the battlefield.”
Biden presses Republicans on Ukraine, says ‘brinkmanship has to end’
US President Joe Biden on Sunday pressed congressional Republicans to back a bill to provide more aid to Ukraine, saying he was “sick and tired” of the political brinkmanship that nearly led to a government shutdown.
Biden spoke after Congress passed a stopgap bill on Saturday that extended government funding for more than a month and avoided a shutdown that would have left most of the federal government’s more than 4 million employees without a paycheck and cut a wide range of services.
The bill, which passed with broad Democratic and Republican support, sparked one lawmaker to pledge to oust the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy.
Brazil’s Lula leaves hospital after hip surgery
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva left hospital on Sunday two days after hip surgery and will spend three weeks recovering at the Alvorada presidential residence, his office and doctors said.
Lula underwent surgery at the Sirio-Libanes Hospital on Friday for arthrosis of the right hip caused by the extremely painful wear and tear of the cartilage on the head of the femur.
His doctors had expected him to remain in the hospital until Tuesday, but he began to walk on Saturday in physiotherapy sessions. The hospital reported he had walked up and down stairs on Sunday.
Indonesians pay tribute to victims of stadium crush, fires set on pitch
Hundreds of Indonesians paid tribute Sunday to the victims of a football stadium crush a year ago that killed 135 people in one of the world’s worst sports disasters, while some locals entered the ground and started fires on the pitch.
Grieving relatives, survivors and fans gathered for a mass prayer at the Kanjuruhan stadium in the East Javan city of Malang, where the fatal stampede unfolded at the end of a match between Arema FC and fierce rivals Persebaya Surabaya.
Locals entered the stadium through its open gates in the evening after Sunday’s prayers, starting fires on the pitch and chanting Arema songs, according to an AFP journalist.
Simone Biles pulls off Yurchenko’s double pike to be named after her at Worlds
American gymnastic Simone Biles became the first woman to do the Yurchenko double pike at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships on Sunday with the vault now to be named after her.
The Yurchenko double pike is the most difficult jump in the women’s scoring code and was rated at 6.4 points by the technical committee in anticipation of it being performed.
The 26-year-old athlete scored 15.266 with a 58.865 total in the all-around, securing the vault to be named Biles II after a different original jump was named after her in 2018.
