World
15 dead, 44 injured in residential building fire in China’s Nanjing city

At least 15 people were killed and 44 injured in a fire at a residential building in eastern China’s Nanjing city, local authorities said.
The fire broke out early Friday morning, officials said at a press conference, with a preliminary investigation suggesting the blaze started on the building’s first floor, where electric bikes had been placed, The Guardian reported.
The building is located in the Yuhuatai district of Nanjing, a city of more than 8 million about 260km north-west of Shanghai.
By 6am (2200 GMT) the fire had been extinguished, and a search-and-rescue operation ended about 2pm Friday, authorities said.
The 44 injured people were sent to hospital for treatment, they added.
China has seen a spate of deadly fires in recent months, prompting calls from President Xi Jinping last month for “deep reflection” and greater efforts to “curb the frequent occurrence of safety accidents”.
In January dozens died after a fire broke out at a store in the central city of Xinyu, with state news agency Xinhua reporting the blaze had been caused by the use of fire by workers in the store’s basement.
That fire came just days after a late-evening blaze at a school in central China’s Henan province killed 13 schoolchildren as they slept in a dormitory.
A teacher at the school told the state-run Hebei Daily that all the victims were from the same third-grade class of nine- and 10-year-olds.
Domestic media reports suggested the fire was caused by an electric heating device.
In November, 26 people were killed and dozens sent to hospital after a fire at a coal company office in northern China’s Shanxi province.
The month before, an explosion at a barbecue restaurant in the north-west of the country left 31 dead and prompted official pledges of a nationwide campaign to promote workplace safety.
In April, a hospital fire in Beijing killed 29 people and forced desperate survivors to jump out of windows to escape.
World
Israel consulted US on its strikes in Gaza, White House told Fox News
Dozens of people were killed in the aftermath of a series of the most violent air attacks on Gaza by Israel since a ceasefire was reached on January 19

The administration of President Donald Trump was consulted on Monday by Israel on its deadly strikes in Gaza, a White House spokesperson told Fox News’ “Hannity” show.
“The Trump administration and the White House were consulted by the Israelis on their attacks in Gaza tonight,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a Fox News interview.
Palestinian medics in Gaza reported dozens of people were killed in the aftermath of a series of the most violent air attacks by Israel on the Palestinian enclave since a ceasefire was reached on January 19 between Israel and Hamas militants.
A senior Hamas official said Israel had unilaterally overturned the ceasefire agreement, Reuters reported.
“As President Trump has made it clear – Hamas, the Houthis, Iran, all those who seek to terrorize not just Israel, but also the United States of America, will see a price to pay. All hell will break loose,” the White House spokesperson said.
Trump had previously publicly issued a warning using similar words, saying Hamas should release all hostages in Gaza or “let hell break out.”
The latest bloodshed in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict was triggered on Oct. 7, 2023, when Palestinian Hamas militants attacked Israel, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostages.
Israel’s subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed over 48,000 Palestinians, according to the local health ministry, while also triggering accusations of genocide and war crimes that Israel denies.
The assault has internally displaced nearly Gaza’s entire 2.3 million population and caused a hunger crisis.
Trump has also been condemned over his plan to displace Palestinians from Gaza and for the U.S. to take over the enclave.
Rights groups, the U.N., Palestinians and Arab states have said Trump’s proposal, which he has put across as a re-development plan, would amount to ethnic cleansing.
Washington separately launched a new wave of airstrikes on Saturday in Yemen in which it said dozens of members of the Houthi movement were left dead.
The Houthis said at least 53 people were killed. Reuters could not independently verify those casualty numbers.
World
Trump and Putin expected to speak this week as US pushes for Russia-Ukraine ceasefire
Trump has warned that unless a ceasefire is reached, the conflict between Moscow and Kyiv has the potential to spiral into World War Three.

U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to speak with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin this week on ways to end the three-year war in Ukraine, U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff told CNN on Sunday after returning from what he described as a “positive” meeting with Putin in Moscow, Reuters reported.
“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 honor 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, emphasized that there are still challenges to be worked out before Russia agrees to a ceasefire, much less a final peaceful resolution to the war, read the report.
Asked on ABC whether the U.S. 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.
A license allowing U.S. energy transactions with Russian financial institutions expired last week, according to the Trump administration, raising pressure on Putin to come to a peace agreement over Ukraine, Reuters reported.
The U.S. Treasury Department is looking at possible sanctions on Russian oil majors and oilfield service companies, a source familiar with the matter said, deepening steps already taken by Biden.
World
Trump says he still has good relations with leader of ‘nuclear power’ North Korea

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday he still has a good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, with whom he held several summits during his first term, and referred to North Korea once again as a “nuclear power.”
Asked by reporters during an Oval Office meeting with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte whether he had plans to reestablish relations with Kim, Trump said: “I would … I have a great relationship with Kim Jong Un, and we’ll see what happens, but certainly he’s a nuclear power,” Reuters reported.
On January 20, when he was inaugurated for his second term, Trump said North Korea was a “nuclear power,” raising questions about whether he would pursue arms reduction talks rather than denuclearization efforts that failed in his first term in any re-engagement with Pyongyang.
After referring to Russia and China’s nuclear arsenals, Trump said: “It would be a great achievement if we could bring down the number. We have so many weapons, and the power is so great.
“And number one, you don’t need them to that extent. And then we’d have to get others, ’cause, as you know, in a smaller way – Kim Jong Un has a lot of nuclear weapons, by the way, a lot, and others do also. You have India, you have Pakistan, you have others that have them, and we get them involved.”
Asked if Trump remarks represented any shift in policy towards North Korea’s nuclear weapons, a White House official said: “President Trump will pursue the complete denuclearization of North Korea, just as he did in his first term.”
On February 15, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Japanese and South Korean counterparts reaffirmed their “resolute commitment to the complete denuclearization” of North Korea in accordance with U.S. Security Council Resolutions.
Last week, Kim Jong Un’s powerful sister Kim Yo Jong criticized the Trump administration for stepping up "provocations" and said it justified North Korea increasing its nuclear deterrent. This week North Korea fired multiple ballistic missiles, its first since Trump took office.
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