Germany summons China's ambassador after military aircraft lasered in Red Sea
"The endangerment of German personnel" and the "disruption of the operation" are "completely unacceptable," the ministry said in a statement on social media platform X on Tuesday.
The maritime surveillance aircraft was part of the EU mission Aspides, which is intended to better defend civilian ships against attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels.
It was lasered earlier this month "without any reason or prior contact" by a Chinese warship that had been encountered several times in the area, the German Defence Ministry said.
It landed safely at a base in Djibouti, and the crew is in good health, it said. The aircraft has since resumed its operations with the EU mission in the Red Sea.
China's spokespeople have not immediately commented.
The EU mission only defends civilian vessels and does not take part in any military strikes. The southern part of the Red Sea is deemed a high-risk zone.
On Tuesday, Yemen's Houthi rebels continued an attack targeting a Liberian-flagged cargo ship in the Red Sea, authorities said, after the group claimed to have sunk another vessel in an assault that threatens to renew combat across the vital waterway. — Euronews
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Arab News
2 hours ago
- Arab News
How Russia established deterrence with its neighbors
During a recent vacation in Georgia, it was interesting to see how people perceived the war in Ukraine. It was also interesting to see the war's impact on their own understanding of how their country should deal with Russia in order to avoid suffering the same fate as Ukraine. Georgia is a small country next to a strong neighbor and every Georgian I met told me a wise policy would be to be on good terms with Russia and not to rely on the West. Russia controls almost 20 percent of Georgian territory. It rules Abkhazia on the Black Sea and South Ossetia in the north of the country. The border between Russia and Georgia is studded with mountains. Russia wants to keep an eye on its smaller neighbor, especially as it is a candidate country for both the EU and NATO. Moscow wants to make sure that, behind that mountainous area, the West will not push for a government that is antagonistic to the Kremlin. Last month, the Georgian parliament's speaker criticized NATO's response to Georgia's membership request, which was made in 2008, saying that the country needs more than words, it needs real protection. The impression is that the West uses countries like Ukraine as fodder to undermine Russia, while having no real interest in their well-being. More than three years on from Russia's full-scale invasion, Ukraine is destroyed. It has lost parts of its territory. It will probably become a rump state and there is no real support for stopping Russia. On the contrary, facing Russian determination, the US is pressuring the weaker party, which is Ukraine, to compromise. My tour guide told me that this goes back centuries. Whenever Georgians have had problems with their neighbors, they have asked for help from European countries but have never received any assistance. I am not sure if this is true or not, but it is certainly the prevailing perception. The lesson is very clear: it is better for the neighbors of Russia to toe the line with Moscow rather than to butt heads with the Russian president. The West is unreliable — it will offer empty words of support but will never confront Russia to save a democracy. If Russia's neighbors are now convinced of that, then Moscow has already won. It has established deterrence. It is important to understand the Russian psyche, which extends beyond the current president. It goes back to the Second World War. Russians believe that the West is arrogant and treacherous. They believe the US left Russia to bear the brunt of fighting the Nazis. They believe the Americans adopted a strategy of buck-passing. They let the Soviet army do the bulk of the fighting and the US intervention was deliberately delayed. The Normandy landings only happened once victory was a done deal. Countries like Georgia understand that. They will not settle for promises from the West. Dr. Dania Koleilat Khatib Late former President Mikhail Gorbachev complained about the West's arrogance. The Soviet Union was a superpower, which the US did its best to fight economically during the Cold War. Gorbachev accepted the dismantling of the Soviet Union in return for promises from the West that it would help lift Russia economically. However, according to a well-known Russian professor colleague of mine, those promises were nothing but lies. Once the communist threat was gone, the West did not lift a finger to prevent the economic collapse of Russia and the independent states that were part of the Soviet Union. The Russians claim that one of the conditions for dismantling the Soviet Union was to stop the expansion of NATO. However, NATO has its open-door policy and it has kept on expanding to the east. NATO has deployed missile defense systems in Poland and Romania. When Russian President Vladimir Putin asked George W. Bush about this, the US president insisted that they were to prevent Iranian missiles from reaching Europe. Putin did not buy it. There is deep mistrust of the West. Hence, even though the Soviet Union collapsed, Russia still wants to be sure that all its neighbors are in its orbit. Even if this means it has to cross mountains and subdue a piece of land to make sure it can keep a close eye on a neighboring government, as it did with Georgia. Russia is also playing the minorities and ethnicities card. In Ukraine, it is using the ethnic Russian population in the Donbas to justify its invasion. However, regardless of whether the president really cares about these people, the Russians do not want NATO troops on their doorstep. NATO's raison d'etre is to counter Russia. During the Cold War, there was a kind of military balance. The Warsaw Pact was an Eastern alliance to counter NATO. The fall of the Soviet Union led to the demise of the Warsaw Pact. Nevertheless, Russia still feels it needs to keep the states in its vicinity in its orbit to fend off any threats emanating from the Western camp. This is why it sees the war in Ukraine as an existential matter. Western countries do not see the war in Ukraine as an existential matter. This is why Russia is ready to sacrifice far more than they are. Countries like Georgia understand that. They will not settle for promises from the West. They need a firm commitment, which the West is unable or unwilling to provide. Until it does so, Russia's neighbors know that their security is better guaranteed by being on good terms with Moscow. The fact that Russia was able to impose this attitude on its neighbors means it has won. Moscow has established deterrence. That is the purpose of war: to deter any current or future threats. No neighbor of Moscow wants to develop a relationship with the West that will fuel the ire of the Russian bear. • Dr. Dania Koleilat Khatib is a specialist in US-Arab relations with a focus on lobbying. She is co-founder of the Research Center for Cooperation and Peace Building, a Lebanese nongovernmental organization focused on Track II.
Leaders
3 hours ago
- Leaders
Eternity C: Houthis Claim Attack on Cargo Ship in Red Sea
Yemen's Houthis on Wednesday claimed responsibility for attacking and sinking the Eternity C cargo ship in the Red Sea, reported Reuters. The Houthis also claimed responsibility for a similar attack on another carrier on Sunday, in which the vessel's crew was rescued before it sank. Claiming Responsibility In a televised address, the Iranian-backed group's spokesperson, Yahya Saree, claimed the attack on the ship, saying it was heading to an Israeli port. 'The operation resulted in the complete sinking of the ship,' he said, adding that 'the Yemeni Navy responded to rescue a number of the ship's crew, provide them with medical care, and transport them to a safe location.' Attack on Eternity C The Eternity C sank on Wednesday, after enduring attacks on Monday and Tuesday. Four of its 25-member crew were killed, six were rescued, while 15 are still missing, Reuters quoted sources at security companies involved in a rescue operation. The attack on Eternity C started on Monday afternoon with sea drones and rocket-propelled grenades launched from speed boats, according to maritime security sources. The attacks continued through Tuesday, forcing the crew to abandon the vessel and jump into the water. The crew included 21 Filipinos and one Russian, in addition to 3 armed guards, including one Greek and one Indian, who was one of those rescued. The European Union (EU) Naval Force, Aspides, confirmed pulling six crew members from the sea. 'Following the attack on the merchant vessel Eternity C in the southern Red Sea, currently six (6) castaway crew members have been recovered from the sea,' it said. Targeting Vessels The attack on Eternity C was the second in recent days, following an earlier attack on the Magic Seas cargo ship on Sunday. However, the vessel's crew was rescued before it sank in the Red Sea. Both vessels were Liberian-flagged and operated by Greek companies. Commenting on the attacks, leading shipping industry associations said in a joint statement: 'These vessels have been attacked with callous disregard for the lives of innocent civilian seafarers and as an inevitable but terrible consequence, seafarers have been killed.' The statement urged for collaborative efforts to protect maritime shipping. 'This tragedy illuminates the need for nations to maintain robust support in protecting shipping and vital sea lanes,' it said. Houthi Attacks on Shipping The Houthis have targeted ships in the Red Sea since November 2023, in solidarity with the Palestinians against Israel, attacking more than 100 ships until December 2024. However, they stopped their attacks during a two-month ceasefire in the Gaza war. The US carried out heavy airstrikes against the Houthis in March 2025, in response to their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea. Then, in May 2025, the Iranian-backed group reached a ceasefire with Washington, brokered by Oman. Moreover, Israel has launched strikes against Houthi sites in Yemen, including Hodeidah, Ras Isa and Salif ports, in response to the group's missile attack on Israel. Short link : Post Views: 8
Arab News
4 hours ago
- Arab News
French police raid far-right party HQ over campaign financing
PARIS: The leader of France's National Rally (RN) said police seized documents from the far-right party's headquarters Wednesday, a raid prosecutors said was linked to a French probe into alleged illegal campaign financing. It is the latest legal trouble for the party of Marine Le Pen, the longtime standard bearer of the French far right, which has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years. The 56-year-old politician, who has three times run for president, suffered a stunning blow in March when a French court convicted her and other party officials over an EU parliament fake jobs scam. The ruling, which Le Pen has appealed, banned her from standing for office for five years, effectively scuppering her ambition of running in France's 2027 presidential elections. Le Pen has asked her top lieutenant, 29-year-old party leader and European Parliament member Jordan Bardella, to prepare to campaign in her place. 'RN headquarters — including the offices of its leaders — are being searched by around 20 police officers from the financial brigade,' Bardella said on X on Wednesday morning. Police accompanied by two investigating magistrates had seized 'all emails, documents and accounting' records of the party, he added. They included 'all files related to the last regional, presidential, parliamentary and European (election) campaigns,' Bardella said, denouncing what he called 'a new harassment operation.' The Paris prosecutor's office said police had raided the party's offices as part of an investigation launched in July last year into alleged illegal campaign financing for the 2022 presidential and parliamentary elections, as well as the European Parliament elections last year. The investigation seeks to 'determine whether these campaigns were notably funded through illegal loans from individuals to the party or RN candidates,' the prosecutor's office added. It said it would also look into allegations the party had included inflated or fake invoices in its claims for the state to reimburse campaign expenses. Police also searched the offices and homes of several company bosses on Wednesday as part of the investigation, which covers the period from January 2020 to July 2024, it said. Under French law, a person can give a maximum of 7,500 euros ($8,800) per year to a political party. Loans are allowed, but only within certain conditions and limits, according to a national commission in charge of scrutinizing campaign financing called the CNCCFP. They should not be 'a disguised donation,' for example. By the end of 2023, the RN had racked up 20 million euros in loans from individuals, with the earliest dating back to 2007, the CNCCFP says. In a separate case, the European Union's prosecutor said Tuesday it has launched a formal investigation into a defunct far-right group, which included France's RN, over the alleged misuse of European Parliament funds. According to the reports by a consortium of European media, most of the allegedly misused funds benefited companies belonging to a former adviser to Le Pen and his wife. Le Pen has challenged her May conviction at the Paris Appeals Court, which has said it will examine the case to allow a decision to be reached in the summer of 2026. This means she could still stand in the 2027 elections — if the verdict is reversed or amended. She also sought an urgent ruling from the European Court for Human Rights to lift her ban on standing for public office. The court threw out the request on Wednesday, stating it saw no 'imminent risk of irreparable harm to a right' protected by the European human rights convention.
