Latest news with #peace talks
News.com.au
a day ago
- Entertainment
- News.com.au
Prince Harry broke this ‘cardinal rule' ahead of secret peace talks with King Charles' aides
Prince Harry broke a 'cardinal rule' in the lead up to last week's secret peace talks between his communications team and King Charles' press rep, according to a royal expert. Royal commentator Charlotte Griffiths claims the Duke of Sussex breached a fundamental protocol by publicly discussing private matters concerning his estranged family, New York Post reports. After Harry aired out his family's dirty laundry on several public platforms — including the bombshell 2021 sit-down interview with Oprah Winfrey, his and Meghan Markle's tell-all Netflix series and his memoir 'Spare' — the king is now very cautious when interacting with his youngest son, Griffiths claims. 'I think he would be willing to meet his demands and it is a pretty simple demand, it is 'if I talk to you, can it not leak out on Oprah Winfrey or any other program?'' Griffiths said of the king's requirements for any future communication with the exiled royal. 'Harry really wants reconciliation and to be able to freely speak to his father, at the moment he cannot get through to his father, he has to go through his aides,' she added. 'What will definitely happen is some ground rules for communications. What Harry cannot do is repeat what goes on in private conversations,' she noted. In an interview with the BBC in May, Harry said he would 'love a reconciliation' with his cancer-stricken father as the Invictus Games founder alluded to King Charles' health being far worse than His Majesty has let on. 'I don't know how much longer my father has,' Harry told the outlet, claiming the king 'won't speak' to him. According to Griffiths, Harry's choice of words weren't received well at Buckingham Palace. 'Harry said 'we don't know how much time my father has left' and that went down extremely badly, that's why this story is so surprising,' she said. 'He broke the cardinal rule which was speculating on the king's health.' Prince Harry's fuelling of public speculation about his ailing father was a clear violation of royal protocol, Griffiths added. While reps for the Sussexes, Meredith Maines and Liam Maguire were spotted chatting to Tobyn Andreae, the monarch's communications secretary, the meeting notably excluded Prince William and Princess Catherine's communications team. According to the royal commentator, the future king, 43, has no interest in mending fences with his estranged brother. Griffiths added that the king's health woes might be the reason behind his willingness to reconcile. 'I think this is driven by the king's health in the respect that the king is very circumspect at the moment and is perhaps in a more forgiving place,' she added.
Al Arabiya
2 days ago
- Politics
- Al Arabiya
Russia returns bodies of 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers
In this episode of W News Extra, presented by Jono Hayes, we report on Russia handing over the bodies of 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers under an agreement reached during last month's peace talks. While two rounds of negotiations in Istanbul have yet to produce a ceasefire, they have led to major prisoner swaps and deals to repatriate fallen soldiers from both sides. Guests: Michael Jabri-Pickett Gemma White
Arab News
2 days ago
- Politics
- Arab News
South Sudan's main opposition party rejects president's call for dialogue to avoid civil war
JUBA: South Sudan 's main opposition party on Thursday dismissed a presidential call for dialogue to avoid the country slipping back into a civil war due to stalled peace talks. Pal Mai Deng, a spokesperson for the opposition SPLM-IO, said President Salva Kiir 'must release political and military leaders of the SPLM-IO who are in detention to show his seriousness about the dialogue.' During the reopening of parliament on Wednesday, Kiir said there was a need for unity and national reconciliation, adding that the 'doors of peace remain open.' 'The suffering of our people must not be prolonged by the continued rejection of dialogue,' he said. The situation in South Sudan remains tense after Vice President Riek Machar — Kiir's former rival — was placed under house arrest following an attack on army bases in March. Several members of the SPLM-IO opposition party have gone into exile fearing arrests. South Sudan signed a peace agreement in 2018, ending a five-year civil war in which nearly 400,000 people died as forces loyal to Kiir and Machar clashed. Deng told The Associated Press that Kiir's appeal was 'paradoxical and insincere' due to the arrests of opposition officials and army attacks on opposition forces. 'Before he (Kiir) urged the parties to resume dialogue, he needed to stop military campaigns against SPLM-IO forces and indiscriminate killing of Nuer civilians he considered anti-government,' said the exiled spokesperson. The CEPO civil society group has warned that Machar's detention has made the continuation of talks impractical. 'The absence of Machar in the function of the government in day-to-day business of the government is making the government of national unity unbalanced,' Edmund Yakani, Executive Director of CEPO, said. The United Nation warned last month that a 2018 peace agreement was on the verge of collapse due to escalating violence, political repression, and foreign military involvement. Yasmin Sooka, chairperson of the UN's Commission on Human Rights in South Sudan, described the situation as a 'crisis' adding that the peace agreement was at the 'brink of irrelevance, threatening a total collapse.'
Al Jazeera
2 days ago
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Russia, Ukraine exchange more bodies of war dead, Kremlin says
Russia and Ukraine have exchanged more bodies of their war dead, according to a Kremlin aide, as part of an agreement reached during a second round of peace talks in Turkiye last month. 'Following the agreements reached in Istanbul, another 1,000 bodies of Ukrainian soldiers were handed over to Ukraine today,' Vladimir Medinsky, head of Russia's delegation at the peace talks, said on Telegram on Thursday, adding that Ukraine handed over 19 slain Russian soldiers. Exchanges of captured soldiers and the repatriation of remains have taken place regularly since the brief renewal of peace talks in Istanbul in May in what amounts to some of the only successful diplomacy between the two sides in their more than three-year war. Medinsky posted photos on Thursday showing people in white medical suits lifting white body bags from the back of refrigerated trucks. Russia plans to return the bodies of 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers, and this exchange marked the beginning of that process, Russia's RIA state news agency reported. During their direct meeting in Istanbul on June 2, Russia and Ukraine pledged to swap at least 1,000 soldiers on each side. Negotiators from both sides also agreed to swap all severely wounded soldiers as well as all captured fighters under the age of 25. But future talks to discuss a path to end the war have stalled as the gulf between Moscow and Kyiv has remained unchanged despite repeated pressure from United States President Donald Trump that Russia agree to a ceasefire. At the talks, Russia outlined a list of hardline demands, including for Ukraine to cede more territory and to reject all forms of Western military support. Kyiv dismissed them as unacceptable ultimatums and has questioned the point of further negotiations if Moscow is not willing to make concessions. In a further diplomatic development, another round of reunification of minors with their families in Russia and Ukraine took place on Thursday with the mediation of Qatar at its Moscow embassy. Eleven children will reunite with their families in Ukraine and three others with their families in Russia. So far, more than 100 children have reunited with their families since Qatar began facilitating the process. Ukraine said Russia took 20,000 children during the war and has given Moscow a list of hundreds who, they said, were taken from Russian-occupied Ukrainian regions since 2022. Russian President Vladimir Putin faces war crime charges before the International Criminal Court in The Hague for the alleged 'unlawful deportation and transfer of children'. Before the latest prisoner exchange, a Russian air strike on a shopping centre and market in Dobropillia in eastern Ukraine killed at least two people, wounded 22 and caused widespread damage on Wednesday, Governor Vadym Filashkin said. Filashkin said the building was struck by a 500kg (1,100lb) bomb. In its latest overnight attacks, Russia launched 400 Shahed and decoy drones as well as one ballistic missile, the Ukrainian air force said. The strikes targeted the northeastern city of Kharkiv, the central city of Kryvyi Rih, Vinnytsia in the west and Odesa in the south. The Russian Ministry of Defence announced that its forces had captured the settlements of Popiv Yar in the eastern region of Donetsk, Degtiarne in Kharkiv in the northeast and Kamianske in Zaporizhia in the south.
Reuters
2 days ago
- Politics
- Reuters
Russia and Ukraine exchange more bodies of war dead, Kremlin aide says
MOSCOW, July 17 (Reuters) - Russia and Ukraine have exchanged more bodies of their war dead, a Kremlin aide said on Thursday, part of an agreement struck at the second round of peace talks in Istanbul in June. Vladimir Medinsky, the head of Russia's delegation at those peace talks, said in a statement on Telegram that Moscow had handed over the bodies of 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers and had received 19 bodies of its own fallen soldiers in return. The RIA state news agency reported, citing a source, that Russia plans to return the bodies of 3,000 Ukrainian soldiers and that the exchange on Thursday was the beginning of that process. The warring sides have carried out a series of swaps of captured troops and the remains of dead soldiers since renewing peace talks in Istanbul in May following a gap of more than three years.
