n a phone chat today, Joe Biden will warn his Chinese
counterpart, Xi Jinping, that he would suffer “costs” if Beijing saves fellow authoritarian partner Russia from heavy western sanctions aimed at punishing Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
The Biden-Xi conversation at 9am, the first since a video meeting in November, will be an opportunity to air differences as the US spearheads an unprecedented pressure campaign on Russia, leaving China in a geopolitical dilemma.
“It’s a chance for President Biden to evaluate where President Xi stands,” the White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said.
Early this morning, air raid sirens sounded in the western Ukraine city of Lviv, followed by the sound of explosions and a column of smoke, a few kilometers from the city centre.
How are the peace discussions going?
Not well. Russia was accused by the UK, US, France, Albania, Ireland and Norway of war crimes, and Paris believed Vladimir Putin was merely pretending to be engaged in negotiating a peace settlement.
Did anybody escape the theatrical shelling in Mariupol? Yes. It appears like the basement, which was utilized as a bomb bunker, held. About 130 people have been rescued so far from the basement, authorities added.
What else is happening?
Here’s what we know on day 23 of the invasion.
Trump White House staffer was covert author of report used to peddle ‘big lie’
Weeks after the 2020 election, at least one Trump White House official was reported as privately drafting a paper that suggested Donald Trump lost to Biden due of Dominion voting systems — information that became the foundation of the former president’s larger attempts to reverse the election.
The Dominion study was apparently developed so it could be distributed to lawmakers in areas where the Trump White House was attempting to get Biden’s victory annulled.
But senior Trump officials would also use the information to consider other alternatives to restore Trump to the presidency, including having the previous president sign off on executive orders to allow extensive emergency powers.
The previously unknown participation of the Trump White House assistant in the drafting of the Dominion report creates the unprecedented circumstance of at least one administration employee being among the initial sources of Trump’s attempts to overthrow the 2020 election.
Who authored the report?
The publicly accessible version of the Dominion report cites as its author Katherine Friess, a volunteer on the Trump post-election legal team. But it was in reality created by the top Trump White House policy advisor Joanna Miller, according to the original version of the paper.
Three US troops alive despite Russia ‘fake news’ accusation, military says
Three current and former members of the Tennessee national guard, who were wrongly named in a Russian media story as mercenaries slain in Ukraine, are in reality alive and well, the Tennessee national guard confirmed yesterday.
Biden ordered the evacuation of US soldiers from Ukraine before to Russia’s invasion of the nation as part of a wider strategy to avoid a direct confrontation with the nuclear-armed foe.
But the story published in Russia’s Pravda newspaper named the Americans by name and stated military ranks for each of them, claiming information from pro-Russian militia in Donetsk, Ukraine.
The article even presented a complex explanation for how the three were identified, utilizing items from a rucksack “near the remains of one of the militants” - including a Tennessee state flag.
What has the Tennessee guard said? A statement read: “They are accounted for, safe – and not, as the newspaper title erroneously implies, US mercenaries slain in Donetsk People’s Republic.”
Where are they? A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said two of the guys were still in the Tennessee national guard and in Tennessee. The second soldier had quit the army but was alive and accounted for — and not in Ukraine.
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