Increasing Pressure on Iran With Threats of Strikes

"Aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), its escorts and embarked Carrier Air Wing 8 have been tasked from their current position in the Caribbean to the Middle East to support a U.S. naval buildup in the region, USNI News has learned."
"Ford, currently in the Caribbean Sea, will join the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group against the backdrop of the Iranian government’s lethal crackdown against protestors and nuclear negotiations between the U.S. and leadership in Tehran, a U.S. official confirmed to USNI News."

U.S. Naval Institute

 

"[Failure to reach a deal with my administration would be] very traumatic."

"I guess over the next month, something like that [timeline for striking a deal on the nuclear program]."

"It should happen quickly. They should agree very quickly."

U.S. President Donald J. Trump 

Sailors aboard aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) conduct routine flight operations on the flight deck, Sept. 26, 2025. US Navy photo

 

The USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier, scheduled for an overdue maintenance has been ordered by the Trump administration to instead extend its deployment despite having been at sea for close to eight months. Accordingly, the aircraft carrier and its escort ships are currently en route to the Middle East in response to Iran's defiance of the U.S. government's pressure for a new nuclear agreement. 

 

From its deployment in the Caribbean Sea, the USS Gerald R. Ford is now scheduled to sail across the Atlantic Ocean with its crew of 4,200 sailors. Whether the carrier's accompanying warships would be included in the orders to deploy to the Middle East or whether other destroyers and vessels would instead sail with the carrier has not yet been established. 

 

President Trump has threatened openly to attack the Islamic Republic should it not comply with his  demands, even as diplomatic overtures are ongoing with an aim to avert kinetic action, adding more violence on top of U.S. strikes hitting Iran's nuclear sites in June of 2025. The tension in the region between Iran, Israel and the United States is palpable and the outcome uncertain.

 

Admiral Daryl Caudle, head of the US. Navy publicly issued an alert last month that the Ford and other vessels comprising its carrier strike group are needful of maintenance and there would be 'some pushback' from him should an extension of the deployment -- which typically lasts about seven months to meet repair schedules -- be sought. "Let's see if there's something else I can do", he said publicly.  

"Extensions for East Coast carrier strike groups beyond the Navy’s planned seven-month deployments have become the norm over the years because of an overworked carrier force resulting from ongoing maintenance delays and combatant commander requirements."

"Since December 2021, CSGs have averaged almost nine-month deployments. The carriers often operated in the Mediterranean, but shifted to Middle East-centric deployments after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks in Southern Israel and the subsequent Houthi aggression in the Red Sea."

U.S. Naval Institute 

The USS Gerald R. Ford, seen here transiting the Strait of Gibraltar, is currently heading toward the Middle East. (MCS Alyssa Joy/U.S. Navy)

 

However, in the event, it appears the Pentagon and the navy reached an agreement that no better alternatives presented, and the carrier would be sent to the Middle East. The USS George H.W. Bush in the midst of an exercise, was not seen to be ready for an assignment, and the USS George Washington was discussed as alternatives, but the latter returned to port in Yokosuka Japan after a Pacific region six-month mission. The Ford had been  diverted to the Caribbean in October joining efforts to press Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro to step down and was directly involved in the Special Operations raid capturing the Venezuelan leader.

 

The massing of firepower in the Middle East will see the Ford joining the USS Abraham Lincoln. Despite last month seeing President Trump considering striking Iran, course was shifted as defence officials raised their concerns over the potential vulnerability of regional security deteriorating. The Pentagon's response to heightened tension with Iran led to assigning two carrier groups providing not merely dozens of fighter jets aboard, but as well the arsenal of missiles and air defence capabilities supplied by accompanying destroyers. 

 

 

Designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a Terrorist Organization

"We need urgent action by our government to protect all Canadians now. Designate Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization now."

"[The Muslim Brotherhood is a] real and immediate threat [to Canada's democracy]."

"Canada will undoubtedly fall [if the government does not act against] Canadian Islamist organizations connected to the Muslim Brotherhood."

Amir Epstein, Tafsik executive director

 

"Chapters of the Muslim Brotherhood purport to be legitimate civic organizations while, behind the scenes, they explicitly and enthusiastically support terrorist groups like Hamas."

U.S. Treasury Department  

The White House

"The Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928, has developed into a transnational network with chapters across the Middle East and beyond.  Relevant here, its chapters in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt engage in or facilitate and support violence and destabilization campaigns that harm their own regions, United States citizens, and United States interests. "

"For example, in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023, attack in Israel, the military wing of the Lebanese chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood joined Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestinian factions to launch multiple rocket attacks against both civilian and military targets within Israel."

"A senior leader of the Egyptian chapter of the Muslim Brotherhood, on October 7, 2023, called for violent attacks against United States partners and interests, and Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood leaders have long provided material support to the militant wing of Hamas.  Such activities threaten the security of American civilians in the Levant and other parts of the Middle East, as well as the safety and stability of our regional partners."

The White House  

B'nai Brith and other Jewish groups have called on the government of Canada for years, to list the Muslim Brotherhood as a  terrorist organization. Those calls have increased since the terrorist attack in southern Israel of October 7, 2023, when six thousand Palestinian terrorists led by Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the PLFP and Fatah streamed across the border from Gaza in an orgy of sadistic mass rape, torture and slaughter of 1,200 Israelis, along with the  hostage-taking of 250 children, women, the elderly civilians, soldiers and foreign farm workers.  

"Unlike Al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood has evolved and learned the hard way that the use of violence will be met with superior violence by state actors. The clever thing to do, it now turns out, was to be patient and invest in a bottom-up movement rather than a commando structure that risked being wiped out by stronger forces."

" Besides, the gradualist approach is far more likely to win the prize of state power. All that Khomeini did before he came to power in Iran was to preach the merits of a society based on Islamic law. He did not engage in terrorism. Yet he and his followers took over Iran – a feat far greater than bin Laden ever achieved. In Iran the violence came later."

Ayyan Hirsi Ali, resident scholar, American Enterprise Institute, Washington 

Policy Alert: New Report Sheds Light on Muslim Brotherhood Terror Ties  Foundation for Defense of Democracies

 

More latterly, members of the Jewish advocacy group Tafsik called on Canada's Liberal government to finally follow the lead of the United States in designating the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. While the MB does not itself act as a terrorist group, it is the founding enterprise that has launched countless terrorist groups whose violence on display with the hard power of jihad complements the MB's jihadist soft power. Hamas itself is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood. 

 

By stealth and presenting as a reasonable alternative to democracy's secular rule, the Muslim Brotherhood portrays Islam as a gentle, peace-loving religion, omitting its instructions to the faithful to dedicate themselves to jihad, Islam's deep drive to convert the world to the worship of Islam through a type of proselytism unique to its founder, the Prophet Mohammad who launched countless wars of conquest, a heritage that encompassed the Middle East, stretched into North Africa, India, Spain, France and the Balkans.

 

Originating in the 1920s in Egypt, the century-old movement employs gentle 'suasion, establishing mosques, hospitals and social centres in the non-Muslim-majority countries it enters to extend its goodwill and influence as far as its  tentacles can reach. And they reach the very heart of governments, social welfare, elite society and the news media through operative contacts made by its adherents with key sympathizers.  

 

The U.S. took the step last month of designating the Lebanese, Egyptian and Jordanian branches of the Muslim Brotherhood, giving them the status of Specially Designated Global Terrorists. A report prepared last year by two French civil servants for the government of France issued a warning that the Muslim Brotherhood movement represented a "threat to national cohesion within the country". France is a country overrun with Muslims, and among them are ample numbers of groups hostile to French values, laws and culture. 

 

Groups linked with and originating from the Muslim Brotherhood, recognized as terrorist organizations, have been listed as such in Canada, including Hamas which, according to the listing identifies Hamas as having "emerged from the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1987". According to Middle East researcher Thomas Juneau, the Muslim Brotherhood is a complex movement with individual chapters in multiple countries worldwide. Its very complexity in relation to its offshoots makes it difficult to list the MB. 

"[Some of those offshoots are] undeniably [terrorist organizations, but others are not]." 

"Even individual chapters are often more loose movements than unified groups."

"Some Muslim Brotherhood groups are clearly not violent, they are clearly not terrorists."

"They adhere to a fairly conservative and pious version of political Islam, but they are not terrorists."

Prof.Thomas Juneau, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa  

Imam Mohammad Tawhidi/Imam of Peace, while acknowledging the complexity of designating the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist entity, nevertheless pressed Canada to make the move to identify it formally as a terrorist group as a reflection of its stealth influence, its undeniable links to violent groups that reflect its totalitarian quest for dominance using the hard power of jihadist terror, while behind the scenes as an innocent, well-meaning interlocutor for Islam, the Muslim Brotherhood does its part on the 'diplomatic' front. 

 

 

"Just because they are difficult to put a finger on, and it's somewhat technically challenging to designate the entire organization ... it does not mean that we do nothing about it at all."

"Ultimately, the Muslim Brotherhood will be designated. The question is, when will the courageous people, the lawmakers, take this stand?"

Mohammad Tawhidi, Imam of Peace 

Canada's Grief

"These kids should be playing hockey or just being kids but life has just been completely turned upside down."

"We know every single person that lost a child, it's a tragedy that has hit our quiet town ... and I just don't really have the words to describe what happened."

"We stayed for those families whose children were not accounted for, it's what we do."

"The number of family members who are dealing with this ... the moms and dads, the sisters and brothers and grandparents ... suddenly people from our congregation are gone."

"It's overwhelming." 

Reverend Gerald Krauss, New Life Assembly 

 

"As we come together in grief and solidarity, it is clear that those impacted will need our support-- not only emotionally but also financially -- as they navigate the challenges ahead."

"Our community has always stood strong in times of adversity, and this is an opportunity for us to extend a helping hand to those who need it most."

Tumbler Ridge Parent Advisory Council

Students walk out of the school building with their hands up after an assailant opened fire in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, Tuesday. Photograph: Western Standard/Jordon Kosik/Reuters

 

It's a modest goal ... to raise $30,000  in support of the families impacted by the dreadful mass shooting that took place in the small remote community of Tumbler Ridge on Tuesday, when a former pupil at the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School armed with deadly weapons rampaged through the school on a killing mission. The killer, named by the RCMP as an 18-year-old who had never completed school but left four years earlier and who, around that same time began to transform himself from a male to a female, showed up at the school dressed identifiably as a woman.

 

He/she shot to death a 36-year-old teacher, three 12-year-old girls, a 12 and two 12 and 13-year old boys. There were 26 students who suffered gunshot wounds, a number of them in critical condition. Two children were in critical condition, one 12-year-old girl was airlifted by medical helicopter to Vancouver. She had been shot in the head and the neck and it was uncertain whether she would survive. Police also went to a house about a five-minute drive from the school, where they found the killer's mother and his 11-year-old stepbrother, both shot dead.  

"This community only has 2,400 people ... That community will have almost every single person affected directly."

"Who do you lean on, when everybody is affected?"

Stephen Fuhr, Member of Parliament for Kelowna, B.C. 

Jesse Van Rootselaar, 18, transgender, will live on in infamy as having perpetrated one of the worst mass shootings in the  history of Canada. Both a long gun and a modified handgun were taken into evidence by police. The town in northwestern British Columbia will never be the same again. Tumbler Ridge RCMP had been alerted to an active shooting at 1:00 p.m. on Tuesday. It took little time for them to find six people dead; five in the school library and the sixth in a stairwell. Dead also was the killer who had committed suicide.

 

  

 

Most of the young people who had been injured in the shooting melee were treated at the site. The emergency alert received by police  described the suspect as "a female in a dress with brown hair". Police did not just spontaneously appear at the private home; they were contacted, the home identified as one where a dread scenario had played out prior to the killer's appearance at the school.  Students whom police had led out of the school for safety were released to their parents' care at the nearby town community centre once the lockdown was lifted.

 

School District 59 officials circulated a decision to suspend normal school activities for both the Tumbler Ridge Secondary School and Tumbler Ridge Elementary for the remainder of the week. Trauma counselling and other supports were in the process of meeting the needs of students, teachers and school staff.

Photo by PAIGE TAYLOR WHITE /AFP via Getty Images   Vancouver Sun

 

"This was a rapidly evolving and dynamic situation, and the swift cooperation from the school, first responders, and the community played a critical role in our response."

"Our thoughts are with the families, loved ones, and all those impacted by this tragic incident."

"This has been an incredibly difficult and emotional day for our community, and we are grateful for the cooperation shown as officers continue their work to advance the investigation."

Superintendent Ken Floyd, North District Commander, B.C. RCMP

 

Terrorism Abounds in Pakistan

Rescue workers transport one of the many injured victims of the bomb explosion at a mosque in Islamabad on Friday. (M.A. Sheikh/The Associated Press)

 

"By the time I reached it there had already been an explosion."

"Bodies were lying everywhere, some were missing arms, some missing legs."

"We took the most injured in our own vehicle [to hospital]." 

Mosque caretaker Syed Ashfaq  

"The morning of February 6, a suicide bomber attacked a Shia mosque in Islamabad, Pakistan. The attack risks worsening regional instability amid a deteriorating security situation in Pakistan. Early reports suggest the attack was carried out by a single actor, who opened fire at security personnel outside a mosque before entering and detonating a suicide vest. In an official statement, Islamabad’s deputy commissioner announced that 31 people had been killed, with another 169 people hospitalized locally, but the death toll is likely to rise."

"No group has yet claimed the attack. Pakistan is home to an enormous variety of terrorist organizations: U.S. officials have identified at least 15 groups, while the Indian nonprofit South Asian Terrorism Portal has listed 44 terrorist organizations operating in the country. Most terrorist violence in Pakistan is associated with three actors: the Islamic State, Baloch militants, and Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

The most likely perpetrator appears to be the Islamic State–⁠Khorasan Province (IS-KP), which operates both in Afghanistan and Pakistan but has a significant interest in mass-casualty international attacks. The group has been implicated in a variety of recent international attacks and plots, including mass-casualty attacks against Crocus City Hall in Moscow and a memorial for Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in Tehran, and plots against the Paris Olympics, cathedrals in Cologne and Vienna, and protests outside of the Swedish parliament."

Center for Strategic and International Studies  

"[India -- Pakistan's eastern neighbour was] assisting the Taliban regime and threatening not only Pakistan but regional and global peace."

"[Pakistan takes strong exception to the situation in Afghanistan where the Taliban regime has created conditions similar to or worse than pre-9/11, when terror organizations posed threats to global peace." 

Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari

Photo: Aamir QURESHI / AFP via Getty Images

 

Tension between Pakistan and the Taliban government next door are high, as Pakistan accuses the Afghan Taliban of supporting Pakistan's own Taliban. How things have changed; before and during the U.S.-led, UN-approved invasion of Afghanistan by NATO forces following the 9/11 atrocities in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania it was Pakistan  through its military and its Inter-agency Intelligence group that supported and gave haven to the Afghan Taliban, at the very time that it declared itself in league with the U.S. in combating terrorism.

 

Afghanistan was invaded by the combined Western forces led by the U.S. because the-then-governing Taliban was sheltering al-Qaeda and its leader, Osama bin Laden. Refusing to surrender Osama bin Laden, known to have been the mastermind of 9/11, a 20-year conflict was launched when the U.S. sought the elusive al-Qaeda leader in the mountains of Afghanistan. It was, in fact, in Abbottabad, Pakistan, at a secret compound, where U.S. Navy Seal commandos found bin Laden and killed him.

 

That compound was not far from a Pakistan army base. It was clear that Pakistan's military knew of the presence of the secretive head of al-Qaeda and likely facilitated his stay there. Next to the compound lived a Pakistani medical doctor who suspected that his neighbour was the infamous bin Laden, and in the belief that his country was in league with the U.S. to discover his whereabouts, he confirmed to the U.S. that the man whose suspicious presence was thought to be bin Laden, really was.

 

For his efforts, Shakil Afridi, the Pakistan physician who had been so helpful to the U.S. was later arrested, charged and convicted in a Pakistan court of treason, and sentenced to 33 years in prison. So much for Pakistan's double game of supporting the war on terrorism while enabling it and giving haven to its leaders. It's fairly rich that now, the country overrun with terrorist groups, portrays itself as an innocent victim. 

 

Thousands gathered in Islamabad to mourn the 32 victims of Friday's attack   Reuters

 

Pakistan accuses India of planning terrorist attacks on Pakistan's soil, but it was a Pakistani terrorist group, Lashkar e-Taiba that conducted a 2008 attack on India's financial hub in Mumbai. A dozen coordinated attacks took place over a period of three days of chaos and violence. Fire, grenade attacks and gunfire took its terror-toll of over $1-billion in damage. No fewer than 166 innocent people died in that series of attacks, with some 300 people wounded. India has much to blame Pakistan for; not the other way around.

 

Last Friday's suicide bombing that took place at a Shiite mosque killing 31 worshippers and wounding 169 was the work of Pakistan's own Islamic State terrorist group, which in fact claimed the glory for the gore it had created. The assertion by Pakistan that terrorism cannot be confronted by any single country in isolation, arrived after global reaction condemning the attack, but Pakistan's role in aiding and abetting terrorists that prey on other countries reveals them for the hypocrites that they are.

 

The government in Afghanistan responded to the claims from Pakistan by proclaiming its innocence in the affair. Its focus is on terrifying its own population, which apparently takes up all its energies, particularly addicted to characterizing women as somewhat subhuman whose role is to complement male desires and to produce following generations, with no self-agency, no rights, no access to education or personal fulfillment. 

 

Police commandos take positions at the site of a bomb explosion at a mosque in Islamabad, Pakistan's capital, on Friday. (Anjum Naveed/The Associated Press)

 

Both New Delhi and Afghanistan's Defence Ministry separately rejected the allegation of the Pakistan government, decrying Islamabad's irresponsibility. The Taliban in Afghanistan, returned to government with the withdrawal of U.S. forces and its allies in 2011, has continued its persecution of its  population and is itself the locus of the presence of other terrorist groups, including ISIS. The Pakistani Taliban, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, has also denied any link to the mosque bombing. 

 

Pakistan's security forces arrested four suspects, among them an Afghan national accused of links to the IS group in Afghanistan, said to have assisted in masterminding the attack. The bomber's mother and brother-in-law have evidently also been detained, with the investigation ongoing. 

 

A Guatemalan Tragedy of Unspeakable Proportions

"All of the villagers in the well were ultimately killed ... I find those killings were done under the watch and orders of Mr. Sosa."

"When the well was being covered up, screams and cries of victims could still be heard. They were left to die a horrible death."

"Members of the patrol unit laughed, as if nothing had happened."

"Mr. Sosa denies that he was present at Las Dos Erres when the massacre took place; however, I place no credence in anything he says."

"Indeed, I consider Mr. Sosa to be a consummate liar."

Federal Court Justice Roger Lafreniere  

Graduation ceremony at the Kaibil, counterinsurgency unit 

"On January 18, 2011, Jorge Vinicio Sosa Orantes was arrested in Alberta, Canada on charges of naturalization fraud in the United States."

"Sosa Orantes, 52, is a former commanding officer of the Guatemalan Special Forces, or Kaibil unit, which brutally murdered more than 250 men, women and children during the 1982 massacre."

"The massacre was part of the Guatemalan military's "scorched earth campaign" and was carried out by the Kaibiles ranger unit. The Kaibiles were specially trained soldiers who became notorious for their use of torture and brutal killing tactics. "

"According to witness testimony, and corroborated through U.S. declassified archives, the Kaibiles entered the town of Dos Erres on the morning of December 6, 1982, and separated the men from women and children. They started torturing the men and raping the women and by the afternoon they had killed almost the entire community, including the children."

"Nearly the entire town was murdered, their bodies thrown into a well and left in nearby fields. The U.S. documents reveal that American officials deliberated over theories of how an entire town could just "disappear," and concluded that the Army was the only force capable of such an organized atrocity. More than 250 people are believed to have died in the massacre."

U.S. National Security Archive 

Harrowing testimony of 'extreme cruelty' perpetrated by unit commanders like Sosa, who ordered the entire village be slaughtered detailed the horror of that fateful day in extinguishing an entire village. The government military force called the Kaibiles had entered the village of Las Dos Erres, in 1982, home to 200 people, searching for weapons said to have been stolen by guerilla forces from the military, and hidden at the village, during the decades-long Guatemalan civil war. No weapons were found, but the order to butcher the entire population of the village commenced over an agonizing period of hours.

 

A baby was thrown into a well to drown, children were smashed against trees, and countless other members of the community were flung into that well, some alive, many dead, their skulls crushed or shot. Women were raped and murdered in front of their children. Sosa, in charge, shot a man and threw a grenade into the well to still the wailing cries of people in their death throes. Ten years after the atrocity investigators exhuming the remains found 'a minimum' of 162 had died in the well; the first victims lying at the bottom were children under age 12, and women.

 

Jorge Vinicio Sosa Orantes was fourth in command of the unit at the time, known to have personally committed murder at the time, and who had also ordered the slaughter of civilians. Testimony from one of Sosa's former military colleagues spoke of his having taught his special military unit techniques of torture on live victims at a zone set aside for practise; the "zombie area".

 

He has been living in Canada for 34 years. Guatemalan authorities, after a prolonged investigation, had issued an arrest warrant against the man in 2000, long after he had left the country. Sosa had moved to the United States where he applied for asylum, in 1985. His claim was denied and he turned to Canada in 1987, applying for asylum at the San Francisco-based Canadian consulate. He withheld the vital information from immigration officials that he had served in the Guatemalan military. Granted refugee status, he achieved citizenship in Canada in 1992.

 

Sosa married an American citizen, then applied and received U.S. citizenship in 1997. U.S. officials became aware of his subterfuge of withholding critical background information in his refugee claims --leading to his extradition from Canada to the U.S. where he was sentenced to ten years in an American prison for immigration fraud, in 2014. Canadian immigration officials three years later initiated a legal process asking a court to revoke Sosa's citizenship, declaring him inadmissible to Canada. 

 

Schoolchildren gather in Dos Erres for an Independence Day celebration on Sept. 15, 1982. (Submitted by Sara Romero)

 

Finally, Canadian citizenship was revoked on the basis of Jorge Vinicio Sosa Orantes having committed unspeakable crimes in Guatemala forty years ago. Federal Court Justice Roger Lafreniere revoked that 34-year-old citizenship, declaring the man inadmissible to the country. Sosa was ordered to pay close to $250,000 to cover costs for the trial expended by the federal government. Costs related to arranging testimony of one of two massacre survivors, of two of Sosa's former military colleagues present at the bloodbath, and eight expert witnesses including Canadian immigration officials.

 

The well in Dos Erres was examined during a dig by forensic anthropologists that was organized by Aura Elana Farfan. (Submitted by FAMDEGUA)

 

President Trump's 'Art of the Deal'

Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy and President Donald Trump pose for a photo during a meeting at the World Economic Forum on Jan. 22, 2026. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/UPI/Shutterstock

"The Americans are proposing the parties end the war by the beginning of this summer and will probably put pressure on the parties precisely according to this schedule."

"And they say that they want to do everything by June. And they will do everything to end the war. And they want a clear schedule of all events."

"Difficult issues remained difficult. Ukraine once again confirmed its position on the Donbas issue."

"'We stand where we stand' is the fairest and most reliable model for a ceasefire today, in our opinion."

"The elections are, for them, definitely more important. Let’s not be naive. They say they want to achieve everything by June, and they will do everything possible to ensure the war ends that way."

"[U.S.] Intelligence showed me the so-called ‘Dmitriev package’ that he [$12 trillion economic cooperation package Russian envoy Kirill Dimitriev] presented in the US."

"There are also various signals, both in the media and elsewhere, that some of these agreements could also involve issues related to Ukraine — for example, our sovereignty or Ukraine’s security."

"We are making it clear that Ukraine will not support any such potential agreements about us that are made without us." 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy 

People shelter inside a metro station during a Russian overnight missile and drone strike in Kyiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 7, 2026.   Alina Smutko/Reuters

 

Russia, revealed President Zelenskyy, presented the U.S. with a $12-trillion (U.S.) economic proposal which he referred to as the 'Dmitriev package'. Such bilateral economic deals form part of the broader negotiating process, meeting certain expectations of U.S. President Trump, the supreme dealmaker. Kyiv, on the other hand, has acquiesced to Trump's wish to ensure U.S. interests are met in Ukraine's rich stores of minerals, to keep in the game.

 

While negotiators on behalf of the U.S. speak of a cessation of conflict, Vladimir Putin knows that the longer Moscow strings out the agonizing process of achieving an agreement represents more opportunity for the Russian military to achieve greater territorial gains. Meaning to continue to press down hard on demanding that Ukraine agree to withdrawing its troops and its continued sovereign aspirations from all territory that Russia has so far wrenched away through its almost-four-year invasion.

 

While President Zelenskyy anxiously tries to read which way President Trump's moods are shifting at any given time, their Russian counterpart oversees ongoing strikes on energy infrastructure in Ukraine, forcing nuclear power plants to cut their output. Over 400 drones and about 40 missile were launched overnight Saturday targeting Ukraine's energy grid, generation facilities and distribution networks.  

"The Russians deliberately targeted, among other things, energy facilities on which the operation of Ukrainian nuclear power plants depends."

"This puts at risk not only our security in Ukraine, but also the shared regional and European security."

"This is a level of attack that no terrorist in the world has ever dared, and Russia must feel the world’s response."

Volodymyr Zelenskyy

Firefighters battle a blaze after a Ukrainian industrial enterprise was struck by a Russian drone attack on Feb. 6, 2026. via REUTERS

 

Ukraine's state energy transmission operator Ukrenergo described this latest attack as the second mass strike on energy infrastructure since the new year. Nuclear power plants were forced to reduce their output; eight facilities in eight regions under attack. "As a result of missile strikes on key high-voltage substations that ensured the output of nuclear power units, all nuclear power plants in the territories under control were forced to reduce their load", increasing the country's power deficit "significantly" forcing hourly power outages in all regions to be extended.

 

Trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi produced no breakthrough -- with both Ukraine and Russia repeating mutually exclusive positions; Russia pressing Ukraine to withdraw from the Donbas where intense fighting is taking place; a demand that Kyiv will never accede to. No common ground  was reached to manage the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant being held by Russia. As for the U.S. proposal that the Donbas region be turned into a free economic zone, Mr. Zelenskyy was skeptical.

 

"I do not know whether this can be implemented, because when we talked about a free economic zone, we had different views on it." Repeated aerial assaults by Russia have focused on the Ukraine power grid. leading to blackouts and heating and water supply disruptions during a bitterly cold winter. Once more the U.S. proposed a ceasefire banning strikes on energy infrastructure. While Ukraine is prepared to observe such a pause, Russia's response could be predicted in its violation of a previous one-week pause it had agreed to in principle that lasted all of four days. 

 

Russia has regularly targeted Ukraine's energy infrastructure during winter

 

 

Raising An AI Pet

"When it comes to data-privacy concerns, the core problem is that the public has very little transparency into what companies are actually doing."

"If you're having highly personal conversations, [with these sweet and cuddly AI toy-companions] there are companies on the other end that are doing the listening and the talking."

R.J. Cross, director, consumer privacy campaign, U.S. Public Interest Research Group

 

"[AI companion toys ranked at No. 9 in official] Top 10 Products of the Year [list in 2025]."

"After all, they not only look cute but also speak nicely."

"They have already outperformed 90 percent of human partners."

Taobao online shopping platform, China 

Zhou Yushu, co-founder of ROPET and a professor at Renmin University of China, poses for photos with AI pet products he has developed, in Beijing, capital of China, May 23, 2025. (Xinhua/Ma Sijia)

"As an extension of traditional pets, AI companions offer stickiness and sustainability."

"Annual compound growth rate has exceeded 8 percent in recent years, and forecasts indicate it could reach 10 percent over the next five years."

Professor Wei Xiang,  University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences  

AI companion pets are the latest consumer sensation out of China where young people have taken to talking pets with no need of being taken for walks nor the routine of messy clean-ups afterward, taking the place of marriage. The digital creatures have become comfort companions, replacing human-to-human interaction; an emotional safety net that owners can confide in without fear of their inner thoughts being broadcast about a circle of friends potentially causing embarrassment and requiring explanations.

AI pets have endeared themselves mostly to young, unattached adults as well as to children. Chinese tech-producing companies including Huawei have designed and developed AI pets with young Chinese who live alone specifically in mind as pet-consumers of the AI-variety. Most of the 'pets' have a fluffy body with large, expressive eyes that light up and have the appearance of emotional expression. Their proliferation has state support within a tightly integrated industrial supply mechanism.

 

The Shenzhen Toy Industry Association projects the AI toy market in China is set to surpass US$1.4 billion by year 2030 at an annual compound growth rate of over 70 percent. This is big business under the umbrella of the state as an experiment in social engineering manipulation that may restore a level of emotional satisfaction and fulfillment absent in a social aura of discontent over economic stability linked to difficulties in securing life partners and establishing families.

Ropet robotic pets mimic the behaviour of a real animal. They require regular feeding and make grumbling sounds when hungry. If you present it with fruits like apples, oranges, or bananas, its eyes—two LED screens—light up with images of food, making interactions with it more enjoyable. PHOTO: CHINA DAILY

 

AI toys with distinct personalities are being offered, such as digital pets by the Shanghai-based tech company Robopoet where, in Las Vegas last month, Fuzozo made its U.S. debut, dubbed the CES event's 'cutest' renditions of 'tech'. Attendees crowded around the show floor to experiment with the palm-size devices to test their responses in various languages, witness how they wobble and briefly appear 'dizzy' when shaken. Two units placed in proximity can communicate with one another for the amused appreciation of onlookers.

 

Most AI toy owners are women in their 20s and 30s who share their experiences on Chinese social media platforms. Female users on Rednote speak of their pets filling an emotional void: "Other people are getting married and giving birth; I'm already raising an AI pet". Moreover, one that can express joy with widened eyes. While real living pets come with real-life problems, AI pets present none of those tedious responsibility burdens.

 

AI pets are considered part of the 'emotional economy', steadily rising in popularity. "This is exactly the need AI pets currently meet: providing emotional companionship along with minimal caregiving costs", pointed out Qi Ye, associate professor of psychology, Renmin University, Beijing. Urban younger generations weighted by the struggle for good grades, find good jobs settle down and have multiple children, find the AI-toy companion trend particularly resonating to their emotional needs.

Zhang Yachun talking to her AI-powered robot named Aluo, AFP