US President Donald Trump was expected to speak with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin this week on ways to end the three-year war in Ukraine, US envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN on Sunday after returning from what he described as a ‘positive’ meeting with Putin in Moscow.
The US would keep attacking Yemen’s Houthis until they ended attacks on shipping, said US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Sunday, as the Iran-aligned group signalled it could escalate in response to deadly US strikes the day before.
Fire ripped through a packed nightclub early on Sunday in the North Macedonian town of Kocani, killing 59 people and injuring more than 100, after sparks ignited the roof over a live band.
Trump and Putin expected to speak this week
US President Donald Trump was expected to speak with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin this week on ways to end the three-year war in Ukraine, US envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN on Sunday after returning from what he described as a “positive” meeting with Putin in Moscow.
“I expect that there will be a call with both presidents this week, and we’re also continuing to engage and have conversation with the Ukrainians,” said Witkoff, who met with Putin on Thursday night, adding that he thought the talk between Trump and Putin would be “really good and positive”.
Trump is trying to win Putin’s support for a 30-day ceasefire proposal that Ukraine accepted last week, as both sides continued trading heavy aerial strikes through the weekend and Russia moved closer to ejecting Ukrainian forces from their months-old foothold in the western Russian region of Kursk.
Trump said in a social media post on Friday that there was “a very good chance that this horrible, bloody war can finally come to an end”. He also said he had “strongly requested” that Putin not kill the thousands of Ukrainian troops that Russia is pushing out of Kursk.
Putin said he would honour Trump’s request to spare the lives of the Ukrainian troops if they surrendered. The Kremlin also said on Friday that Putin had sent Trump a message about his ceasefire plan via Witkoff, expressing “cautious optimism” that a deal could be reached to end the conflict.
In separate appearances on Sunday shows, Witkoff, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Trump's national security adviser, Mike Waltz, emphasised that there were still challenges to be worked out before Russia agreed to a ceasefire, much less a final peaceful resolution to the war.
Asked on ABC whether the US would accept a peace deal in which Russia was allowed to keep stretches of eastern Ukraine that it has seized, Waltz replied, “Are we going to drive every Russian off of every inch of Ukrainian soil?” He added that the negotiations had to be grounded in “reality”.
Rubio told CBS a final peace deal would “involve a lot of hard work, concessions from both Russia and Ukraine”, and that it would be difficult to even begin those negotiations “as long as they're shooting at each other”.
Trump has warned that unless a ceasefire is reached, the conflict between Moscow and Kyiv has the potential to spiral into World War Three.
His administration took steps last week to induce further cooperation on a ceasefire. On Saturday, Trump said that General Keith Kellogg’s role had been narrowed from special envoy for Ukraine and Russia to only Ukraine, after Russian officials sought to exclude him from peace talks.
US ‘will keep hitting Houthis until shipping attacks stop’
The US would keep attacking Yemen’s Houthis until they ended attacks on shipping, said US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Sunday, as the Iran-aligned group signalled it could escalate in response to deadly US strikes the day before.
The airstrikes, which killed at least 31 people, were the biggest US military operation in the Middle East since Trump took office in January. One US official told Reuters the campaign might continue for weeks.
The Houthi movement’s political bureau described the attacks as a “war crime” and said Houthi forces were ready to “meet escalation with escalation”, while Moscow urged Washington to cease the strikes.
Hegseth told Fox News: “The minute the Houthis say we’ll stop shooting at your ships, we’ll stop shooting at your drones, this campaign will end, but until then it will be unrelenting.”
“This is about stopping the shooting at assets ... in that critical waterway, to reopen freedom of navigation, which is a core national interest of the United States, and Iran has been enabling the Houthis for far too long. They better back off.”
The Houthis, who have taken control of most of Yemen over the past decade, said last week they would resume attacks on Israeli ships passing through the Red Sea if Israel did not lift a block on aid entering Gaza.
They had launched scores of attacks on shipping after Israel’s war with Hamas began in late 2023, saying they were acting in solidarity with Gaza's Palestinians.
Trump also told Iran, the Houthis’ main backer, to stop supporting the group immediately. He said if Iran threatened the United States, “America will hold you fully accountable and, we won’t be nice about it!”
In response, Hossein Salami, the top commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, said the Houthis took their own decisions.
“We warn our enemies that Iran will respond decisively and destructively if they carry out their threats,” he told state media.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told CBS News’ Face the Nation programme: “There’s no way the ... Houthis would have the ability to do this kind of thing unless they had support from Iran. And so this was a message to Iran: don’t keep supporting them, because then you will also be responsible for what they are doing in attacking Navy ships and attacking global shipping.”
Most of the 31 people confirmed killed in the US strikes were women and children, said Anees al-Asbahi, the spokesperson for the Houthi-run health ministry. More than 100 were injured.
Residents in Sanaa said the strikes hit a neighbourhood known to host several members of the Houthi leadership.
Strikes also targeted Houthi military sites in the city of Taiz, said two witnesses on Sunday.
Another strike, on a power station in the town of Dahyan, led to a power cut, Al-Masirah TV reported early on Sunday. Dahyan is where Abdul Malik al-Houthi, the enigmatic leader of the Houthis, often meets visitors.
The US military’s Central Command described Saturday’s strikes as the start of a large-scale operation across Yemen.
The strikes were carried out in part by fighter aircraft from the aircraft carrier Harry S Truman in the Red Sea, said officials.
Fire at North Macedonia nightclub kills 59, injures more than 100 people
Fire ripped through a packed nightclub early on Sunday in the North Macedonian town of Kocani, killing 59 people and injuring more than 100, after sparks ignited the roof over a live band.
Arrest warrants had been issued for four people in connection with the fire, said interior minister Pance Toskovski. State news agency Mia said the police had detained the owner of the club over the incident.
One video from the event, verified by Reuters, showed a band playing on stage flanked by two flares, the white sparks of which set the ceiling alight.
Friends and family were separated in a panicked rush to the exits.
Interior Minister Pance Toskovski confirmed that the fire was caused by “pyrotechnic devices” whose sparks triggered the blaze.
About 148 people were hospitalised in Skopje, Kocani and surrounding towns, said Health Minister Arben Taravari at a press conference. Eighteen people were critically injured, said Taravari.
North Macedonia’s Public Prosecutor Ljupco Kocevski said five prosecutors would investigate the incident.
Trump administration weighs travel ban on dozens of countries
The Trump administration is considering issuing sweeping travel restrictions for the citizens of dozens of countries as part of a new ban, according to sources familiar with the matter and an internal memo seen by Reuters.
The memo lists a total of 41 countries divided into three separate groups. The first group of 10 countries, including Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, Cuba and North Korea among others, would be set for a full visa suspension.
In the second group, five countries — Eritrea, Haiti, Laos, Myanmar and South Sudan — would face partial suspensions that would affect tourist and student visas as well as other immigrant visas, with some exceptions.
In the third group, 26 countries, including Belarus, Pakistan and Turkmenistan, would be considered for a partial suspension of US visa issuance if their governments “do not make efforts to address deficiencies within 60 days”, said the memo.
A US official speaking on the condition of anonymity cautioned there could be changes on the list and that it was yet to be approved by the administration, including US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
Rights group files lawsuit to block Trump deportations of pro-Palestinian protesters
The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) filed a lawsuit challenging as unconstitutional the Trump administration’s actions to deport international students and scholars who protest or express support for Palestinian rights.
The lawsuit, filed on Saturday in the US District Court for the Northern District of New York, seeks a nationwide temporary restraining order to block enforcement of two executive orders signed by Trump in the first month of his term.
The lawsuit comes after the detention of a Columbia University student, Mahmoud Khalil, a 30-year-old permanent US resident of Palestinian descent, whose arrest sparked protests this month.
Justice Department lawyers have argued that the US government is seeking Khalil’s removal because Secretary of State Marco Rubio has reasonable grounds to believe his activities or presence in the country could have “serious adverse foreign policy consequences”. Rubio on Friday said the US was likely to revoke the visas of more students in the coming days.
Trump vowed to deport activists who took part in protests on US college campuses against Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza following the October 2023 attack by the Palestinian militants.
The ADC lawsuit was filed on behalf of two graduate students and a professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, who say their activism and support of the Palestinian people “has put them at serious risk of political persecution”.
“This lawsuit is a necessary step to preserve our most fundamental constitutional protections. The First Amendment guarantees the freedom of speech and expression to all persons within the United States, without exception,” said Abed Ayoub, national executive director of the ADC.
Israeli strikes kill 14 people in Gaza
Israeli military strikes had killed at least 14 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, said the enclave’s Health Ministry on Sunday, as Arab and US mediators worked to shore up a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Palestinian officials say dozens of people have been killed by Israeli fire despite the January 19 truce that halted large-scale fighting in Gaza.
Israel’s military has said its forces have intervened to thwart threats by “terrorists” approaching its troops or planting bombs since the ceasefire took effect.
Gaza’s Health Ministry said most of the latest deaths took place on Saturday when an Israeli airstrike killed nine Palestinians including four journalists in the town of Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip.
The Israeli military said six men that it had identified as members of the armed wings of Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad militant group had been killed in the strike. It said some of the militants had operated “under the cover of journalists”.
Salama Marouf, the head of the Hamas-run Gaza government media office, said the military's statement about the incident included the names of people who were not present.
It was based on inaccurate social media reports “without even bothering to verify the facts”, said Marouf.
At least four more Palestinians were killed in separate Israeli strikes on Saturday, said the Gaza health officials.
An Israeli drone had fired a missile at a group of Palestinians in the town of Juhr Eldeek in central Gaza on Sunday, killing a 62-year-old man and wounding several others, said the medics. Several others were hurt when an Israeli drone fired a missile towards a group of people in Rafah, they added.
The Israeli military said it was not familiar with the reported drone strikes.
Persistent bloodshed in Gaza underscores the fragility of the three-stage ceasefire agreement mediated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, which have stepped in to hammer out a deal between Israel and Hamas over how to proceed.
Israel wants to extend the ceasefire’s first phase, a proposal backed by US envoy Steve Witkoff. Hamas says it will resume freeing hostages only under the second phase that was due to begin on 2 March.
The war began when Hamas carried out a cross-border raid into southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing 1,200 people and capturing 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel’s subsequent assault on Gaza has killed more than 48,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, reduced much of the territory to rubble, and led to accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies.
Venezuela blasts ‘illegal’ US deportations under wartime law
Venezuela’s government on Sunday blasted the US implementation of a rarely used wartime law, rapidly blocked by a US judge, to deport more than 200 alleged members of Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua to El Salvador
“Venezuela rejects the application of an anachronistic law, illegal and in violation of human rights, against our migrants,” said Venezuela's government in a statement, adding its “profound indignation at the threat of kidnapping 14-year-old children”.
El Salvador’s presidential office did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment and it was not immediately clear what charges the alleged gang members face in El Salvador, or whether children are part of the group.
El Salvador President Nayib Bukele said in a post on X early on Sunday that it had received the first 238 alleged members of Tren de Aragua, and they had been immediately transferred to a terrorism detention centre for one year, subject to renewal.
This was a day after the Associated Press reported, citing an internal memo, that the United States would pay El Salvador $6-million for the arrangement.
“The United States will pay a very low fee for them, but a high one for us,” said Bukele in the post, adding that the country had also sent 23 members of the Salvadoran gang MS-13.
US President Donald Trump on Friday invoked the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to rapidly deport alleged members of Tren de Aragua, a criminal organization that has been linked to kidnapping, extortion, organised crime and contract killings.
A day later, a federal judge in Washington, DC, blocked the application of the law for 14 days, saying the statute referred to “hostile acts” perpetrated by another country that are “commensurate to war”.
The timing of when the flights carrying the alleged gang members departed the US and arrived in El Salvador remained unclear, but an X post by Bukele suggested it was underway before the US judge’s order.
“Oopsie...too late,” Bukele posted in response to the order.
It's not for Russia to decide on peacekeepers in Ukraine - Macron
The stationing of peacekeeping troops in Ukraine, as proposed by Britain and France as part of a ceasefire agreement with Russia, was a question for Kyiv to decide and not Moscow, said French President Emmanuel Macron in an interview.
Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer have been rushing to consolidate military support for Ukraine as Trump presses for a peace deal with Russia. Starmer hosted a virtual meeting on Saturday with Macron and other non-US allies of Ukraine.
“Ukraine is sovereign. If it asks for allied forces to be on its territory, it’s not something for Russia to accept or not,” said Macron in a joint interview with several French regional newspapers published late on Saturday.
Russia has repeatedly rejected the idea of soldiers from countries belonging to the Nato alliance being stationed in Ukraine.
Macron said any peacekeeping force would consist of “a few thousand troops per country” to be deployed at key locations, adding a number of European and non-European countries were interested in participating.
But like other aspects of a potential truce, the form of any peacekeeping force remains uncertain.
Finland’s President Alexander Stubb told BBC television that any firm commitments would come once there was a clear plan.
“There are anywhere from zero to 50 different ways they can help, boots on the ground is only one way. You can talk about intelligence, you can talk about different types of things but it's too early to commit right now,” he said.
Britain and France both say they could send peacekeepers to Ukraine, while Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said his country was also open to requests. DM