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EU agrees new rules on hosting migrants, seeks to cut numbers

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The European Union reached agreement early on Wednesday on new rules designed to share out the cost and work of hosting migrants more evenly and to limit the numbers of people coming in, Reuters reported.

Representatives of the European Parliament and of EU governments reached an accord after all-night talks on EU laws collectively called the New Pact on Migration and Asylum that should start taking effect next year.

The laws cover screening irregular migrants when they arrive in the European Union, procedures for handling asylum applications, rules on determining which EU country is responsible for handling applications and ways to handle crises.

Migrant arrivals in the European Union are way down from the 2015 peak of more than 1 million, but have steadily crept up from a 2020 low to 255,000 in the year to November, with more than half crossing the Mediterranean from Africa, mainly to Italy, read the report.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi called the pact a “great success” for Europe and Italy and meant that EU border countries most exposed to migration would no longer feel alone.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said agreement on the past was very important, relieving states affected – including Germany.

Previous efforts to share out the responsibility of hosting migrants have foundered because eastern EU members in particular were unwilling to take in people who had arrived in Greece, Italy and other countries.

Under the new system, countries not at the border will have to choose between accepting their share of 30,000 asylum applicants or paying at least 20,000 euros ($21,870) per person into an EU fund.

The screening system envisaged will seek to distinguish between those in need of international protection and others who are not.

People whose asylum applications have a low chance of success, such as those from India, Tunisia or Turkey, can be prevented from entering the EU and detained at the border, as can people seen as representing a threat to security.

Processing of applications would also be sped up, Reuters reported.

Amnesty International said the pact would set EU asylum law back decades and lead to greater suffering for people seeking asylum and was a system designed to make it harder for people to access safety.

“The pact will almost certainly cause more people to be put into de facto detention at EU borders, including families with children and people in vulnerable situations,” it said.

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Small plane crashes into San Diego neighborhood, killing at least 2

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At least two people were killed and eight others injured on Thursday when a small plane crashed in a San Diego neighborhood where military families lived, damaging houses and vehicles.

The crash occurred around 3:45 a.m. local time (1045 GMT) in a military housing complex in the Tierrasanta neighborhood, local officials said. The crash site is a little more than 2 miles east of Montgomery-Gibbs Executive Airport, Reuters reported.

It was unclear how many people were onboard the plane when it crashed. Police said they believed no one on the ground was killed but could not immediately confirm that.

“We had a plane that had come through this neighborhood, taking out one home,” San Diego Fire-Rescue Assistant Chief Dan Eddy said at a news conference in front of a damaged home.

When fire crews arrived on scene, they found one home and multiple vehicles on fire, Eddy said.

The San Diego Police Department reported two people were confirmed dead and eight others were injured, as of 11 a.m. Thursday.

Only one person with minor injuries was transported to a hospital as of Thursday morning, Eddy said.

About 100 people were evacuated from homes in the neighborhood as of late Thursday morning.

The plane was identified as a Cessna 550 by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The plane, whose route originated in the Midwest, was bound for San Diego, Eddy said.

The tract where the crash occurred is managed by Liberty Military Housing, officials said.

“We are actively working with all military families affected, specifically within this region, because they may be out of their homes for a while,” said Captain Bob Heely, commanding officer of Naval Base San Diego.

Heely said he was working with Liberty Military Housing and the Red Cross to provide temporary housing to the affected families.

“As you can see, the damage behind us is incredibly significant, was life-threatening, and thank God nobody on the ground was killed,” Raul Campillo, a member of the San Diego City Council, said at a news conference near the crash site.

The crash will be investigated by the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board.

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Two Israeli embassy staffers killed in Washington shooting, suspect held

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Two Israeli embassy staff were killed in a shooting outside an event at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC, on Wednesday night, and a suspect is in custody, officials said.

A man and a woman were shot and killed in the area of 3rd and F streets in Northwest which is near the museum, an FBI field office and the U.S. attorney’s office. They were a young couple about to be engaged to be married, the Israeli ambassador said, Reuters reported.

Washington Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith said a single suspect who was seen pacing outside the museum before the event was in custody. The suspect, tentatively identified as 30-year-old Elias Rodriguez, chanted “Free Palestine, Free Palestine,” in custody, she said.

The suspect had no previous contact with police, she added.

President Donald Trump condemned the shooting. “These horrible D.C. killings, based obviously on antisemitism, must end, NOW!” he said in a message on Truth Social. “Hatred and Radicalism have no place in the USA.”

Israeli President Isaac Herzog and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also condemned the incident.

Tal Naim Cohen, a spokesperson for the Israeli embassy in Washington, said two of its staff members were shot “at close range” while attending a Jewish event at the museum.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said in a post on X:

“We will bring this depraved perpetrator to justice.”

FBI Director Kash Patel said he and his team had been briefed on the shooting.

“While we’re working with (Metropolitan Police Department) to respond and learn more, in the immediate, please pray for the victims and their families,” he wrote on X.

Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, called the shooting “a depraved act of anti-Semitic terrorism.”

“Harming diplomats and the Jewish community is crossing a red line,” Danon said in a post on X. “We are confident that the US authorities will take strong action against those responsible for this criminal act.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi and U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro were at the scene of the shooting.

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Trump calls his own foreign aid cuts at USAID ‘devastating’

Washington was funding 17% of the country’s HIV budget before the cuts. In the months since, testing and monitoring of HIV patients across South Africa has decreased, Reuters has reported.

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President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that his administration’s cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development and its aid programs worldwide have been “devastating.”, Reuters reported.

Speaking beside South African President Cyril Ramaphosa during a White House visit, Trump was asked about his cutting most foreign aid by a reporter who said the decision had significant impacts in Africa.

“It’s devastating, and hopefully a lot of people are going to start spending a lot of money,” Trump said in the Oval Office.

“I’ve talked to other nations. We want them to chip in and spend money too, and we’ve spent a lot. And it’s a big – it’s a tremendous problem going on in many countries. A lot of problems going on. The United States always gets the request for money. Nobody else helps.”

The State Department, which manages USAID, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The administration has repeatedly defended the cuts, saying they were focused on wasted funds. The gutting of the agency, largely overseen by South Africa-born businessman Elon Musk, is the subject of several federal lawsuits, read the report.

The United States is the world’s largest humanitarian aid donor, amounting to at least 38% of all contributions recorded by the United Nations. It disbursed $61 billion in foreign assistance last year, just over half of it via USAID, according to government data.

The U.S. spent half a billion dollars on South African aid in 2023, mostly on healthcare, the most recent data shows. Most of that funding has been withdrawn, though it is unclear exactly how much.

The cuts have had an effect on the country’s response to the HIV epidemic. South Africa has the world’s highest burden of HIV, with about 8 million people – one in five adults – living with the virus, Reuters reported.

Washington was funding 17% of the country’s HIV budget before the cuts. In the months since, testing and monitoring of HIV patients across South Africa has decreased, Reuters has reported.

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