| | | | | | | Hello. After nearly two years of pushing back against Russia’s invasion, Ukraine is struggling to find new volunteers to join the front line. Sarah Rainsford witnesses a conscription officer’s efforts in the city of Cherkasy. As Israel faces mounting warnings over a ground offensive in Gaza’s city of Rafah, Paul Adams questions the plans for a potential civilian evacuation. We end this edition with a look at colourful Carnival celebrations in Latin America. |
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| | | | | | AT THE SCENE | Cherkasy, Ukraine | | Ukraine’s army recruitment problem | | | | Most of those who wanted to fight are either dead, injured or still stuck at the front waiting to be relieved by new recruits. Credit: BBC | | Nearly two years after Russia’s full-scale invasion, enthusiasm for serving in the Ukrainian army is waning. The flood of volunteers to the front line has dried up and when conscription officers like Pavlo Zhilin walk down the road, men often swerve to avoid them. | | | | Sarah Rainsford, Eastern Europe correspondent |
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| At 24, Pavlo has sacrificed a lot for his country. He fought near Kyiv, then Soledar in the eastern Donbas, where the battle was brutal. That first summer, he was moved to Bakhmut, where he was badly injured. His right arm was amputated below the shoulder, he still feels pain where his limb is missing, and he has shrapnel in his leg. His basic prosthetic gives him limited movement. But he wanted to go on serving.
After all he's been through, I wonder whether he understands why other men evade the draft. "One day, their children will ask what they did during the war, when the men were fighting. When they reply, 'I was hiding,' then they'll plummet in the children's eyes," Pavlo says firmly. And yet the price Ukraine is paying to defend itself is already immense. When I ask Pavlo whether he's lost friends in the fighting, he admits that there's "almost no one left" from his entire company. "The only ones left are [injured] like me. The others are dead." |
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| Questions Answered | | The question of Rafah civilian evacuations | | | | Rafah had a pre-war population of around 270,000, but it’s now one vast refugee camp. Credit: Getty Images |
| | Israel is facing mounting international pressure over its planned offensive in Rafah. Gaza’s southernmost city, near the border with Egypt, now hosts an estimated 1.5 million people who have been displaced from other parts of the territory during Israel’s offensive, launched in the aftermath of Hamas’s deadly 7 October attacks. Plans for a civilian evacuation of the city are, at present, elusive. | | | | Paul Adams, Diplomatic correspondent |
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| | Why is Israel targeting the city? | | Israel says that of Hamas's six remaining battalions, four are in Rafah. It's possible that some of the group's main leaders are also there - although the existence of tunnels from Rafah into Egypt also means that some may have escaped the Gaza Strip. | | What’s the situation on the ground? | | Satellite images of Rafah show that virtually every open space in the city has been taken up by tents and other temporary shelters. By some estimates, the population density has soared from 4,100 people per square kilometre to something approaching 20,000. These are people who have fled from cities, refugee camps and villages further north. | | How would an evacuation work? | | To move 1.5 million people out of harm's way, Israel needs the cooperation of the international aid community, in particular the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the UN agency responsible for Palestinian refugees. But with relations with the UN at rock bottom, the prospects for cooperation are vanishingly small. | | | | • | Export license: A Dutch court has ruled the government must halt delivery of F-35 fighter aircraft parts to Israel over concerns they are being used to violate international law. | | • | Rafah raid: Details of an overnight Israeli military operation which freed two Israeli-Argentine hostages held captive by Hamas have begun to emerge. Here’s what we know. | | • | ‘Where can we go?’: Palestinian doctor Ahmed Abuibaid told the BBC people in Rafah are terrified about the prospect of an Israeli ground offensive. |
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| | The big picture | | Extinction threat facing migratory species | | | | From the European eel to the African penguin, migratory species are the great explorers of the animal kingdom. Mike Korostelev/Getty Images |
| | One in five migratory species that are key to protecting the Earth’s habitat are threatened with extinction due to human activities, including excessive hunting and killing of animals, climate change and the expansion of towns and cities bringing noise and light pollution. | | | | |
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| | | For your downtime | | Beyhive readies for hoedown | | Beyoncé’s newly dropped tracks anticipate an album intent on reclaiming country music. | | |
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| | And finally... in Latin America | | Brazil celebrated Carnival over the weekend, with a parade in Rio de Janeiro honouring the Amazon and Indigenous culture. Watch the footage. Carnival Monday marks instead the height of celebrations in Trinidad and Tobago, where the hills on Paramin come alive with the annual blue devil masquerade competition. Take a look. |
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– Sofia |
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