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Australia Dodges Call for Arrest of Visiting Israel President

Herzog has been invited to a four-day visit to Australia to meet with the Jewish community after the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah festival in Sydney killed 15 people. Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP/File
Herzog has been invited to a four-day visit to Australia to meet with the Jewish community after the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah festival in Sydney killed 15 people. Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP/File
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Australia Dodges Call for Arrest of Visiting Israel President

Herzog has been invited to a four-day visit to Australia to meet with the Jewish community after the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah festival in Sydney killed 15 people. Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP/File
Herzog has been invited to a four-day visit to Australia to meet with the Jewish community after the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah festival in Sydney killed 15 people. Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP/File

Australia's government sidestepped a call Thursday for Israeli President Isaac Herzog to be arrested when he visits the country to pay respect to victims of an antisemitic mass shooting on Bondi Beach.

Herzog has been invited to a four-day visit from Monday to meet with the Jewish community after the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah festival in Sydney killed 15 people, said AFP

A UN-established inquiry found in 2025 that Herzog "incited the commission of genocide" by saying all Palestinians -- "an entire nation" -- were responsible for the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.

Israel has "categorically" rejected the inquiry's report, describing it as "distorted and false" and calling for the body's abolishment.

"He should be arrested if he comes," said human rights lawyer Chris Sidoti, who is a member of the UN's Independent International Commission of Inquiry looking into rights abuses in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Sidoti has publicly called for Herzog's invitation to be withdrawn, or for his arrest on arrival.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese made a "silly mistake" by inviting the Israeli head of state, the human rights lawyer told AFP.

"It was the wrong decision, and it needs to be cancelled before it's too late."

Asked about the call for Herzog's arrest, Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong said he had been invited by the government in line with the wishes of the Jewish community.

"President Herzog is being invited to Australia to honor the victims of Bondi and to be with and provide support to the Australian Jewish community in the wake of the worst on-soil terrorist attack and antisemitic attack that we have seen," she said.

Pro-Palestinian activists have called for protests around the country against Herzog's visit, including in Sydney, where the police have refused to authorize demonstrations under new powers granted after the Bondi attack.

Australia's federal police said Thursday a 19-year-old Sydney man had been charged with making an online "threat to kill" against a foreign head of state.

Police declined to confirm local media reports that Herzog was the target.

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World

UK's Starmer Expresses Regret over Mandelson Appointment as Ambassador to Washington

 British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (EPA) 
 British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (EPA) 
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UK's Starmer Expresses Regret over Mandelson Appointment as Ambassador to Washington

 British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (EPA) 
 British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (EPA) 

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday he regretted appointing Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the United States, saying the Labor veteran “repeatedly” lied and misrepresented his ties to the late US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Mandelson, who was sacked in September after seven months in the job, is accused of passing on market-sensitive information that was of clear financial interest to Epstein while serving as business secretary in Gordon Brown government between 2008 and 2010.

In Parliament on Wednesday, Starmer said the latest revelations about Mandelson were “beyond infuriating,” and that the former ambassador had “lied repeatedly to my team when asked about his relationship with Epstein.”

He added, “I regret appointing him. If I knew then what I know now, he would never have been anywhere near government.”

“Mandelson betrayed our country, our Parliament and my party,” said Starmer, leader of the Labor Party.

The British PM ceded to pressure from the opposition Conservative Party to release documents on how Mandelson was appointed, and was forced to water down an attempt to limit the scope of that disclosure after facing a revolt in his own Labor Party.

In a 2003 message for his 50th birthday, Mandelson had described Epstein as his “best pal.”

British police said on Tuesday they have launched an investigation into Mandelson over alleged misconduct in public office following the release of millions of documents related to Epstein.

Asked in parliament whether vetting carried out before Mandelson's appointment had mentioned that the Labor veteran and Epstein had had an ongoing relationship, Starmer replied: “Yes, it did. As a result, various questions were put to him.”

He then said Mandelson had lied throughout the process and that related documents would show this.

World

Trump Declines to Take Sides Between Vance, Rubio in 2028 Successor Debate

US President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio (AP)
US President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio (AP)
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Trump Declines to Take Sides Between Vance, Rubio in 2028 Successor Debate

US President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio (AP)
US President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio (AP)

President Donald Trump on Wednesday declined to take sides in the debate over whether his vice president, JD Vance, or his secretary of state, Marco Rubio, would most likely be his successor in the 2028 Republican presidential campaign.

Vance, a former Republican senator from Ohio, has said he will talk to Trump about the possibility of running after the November midterm elections, reported Reuters.

There is also speculation among Republican insiders that Rubio, a former senator from Florida who ran for the Republican Party's presidential nomination in 2016 and lost to Trump, could seek the presidency.

Rubio has ‌not closed the ‌door to running in 2028, but ‌has praised ⁠Vance as ‌a strong potential candidate.

Trump said he would "be inclined" to endorse a successor when asked about Vance and Rubio during an interview with NBC News, but added that he did not want to get into the subject now. “We have three years to go. I don’t want to, you know, I have two people that are doing a great ⁠job. I don’t want to have an argument with, or I don’t want to ‌use the word ‘fight’ — it wouldn’t be a ‍fight. But look, JD is ‍fantastic, and Marco is fantastic," Trump said.

Trump has often said the ‍two men should run together on the same ticket. The 2028 election will feature a wide-open race on both the Republican and Democratic sides and crowded fields are expected.

In a possible nod to Rubio, the country's chief diplomat, Trump said of the pair: “I would say one is slightly more diplomatic than the other."

He called them ⁠both men of very high intelligence.

"I think there’s a difference in style," Trump said. “You know, you can see the style yourself. But they’re both very capable. I do think this: The combination of JD and Marco would be very hard to be beaten, I think. But you never know in politics, right?”

Trump in the interview also again appeared to toy with the possibility of seeking an unconstitutional third term. He had flirted with the idea last year, later abandoning the concept.

Asked if he saw “any scenario” in which he would ‌still be president when the next president's term begins in January 2029, Trump said: “I don’t know. It would be interesting.”

World

Ukraine, Russia, US to Start Second Day of War Talks

Employees repair sections of the Darnytska combined heat and power plant damaged by Russian air strikes in Kyiv, on February 4, 2026, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Roman PILIPEY / AFP
Employees repair sections of the Darnytska combined heat and power plant damaged by Russian air strikes in Kyiv, on February 4, 2026, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Roman PILIPEY / AFP
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Ukraine, Russia, US to Start Second Day of War Talks

Employees repair sections of the Darnytska combined heat and power plant damaged by Russian air strikes in Kyiv, on February 4, 2026, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Roman PILIPEY / AFP
Employees repair sections of the Darnytska combined heat and power plant damaged by Russian air strikes in Kyiv, on February 4, 2026, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Roman PILIPEY / AFP

Ukraine, Russia and the United States will start a second day of talks in Abu Dhabi on Thursday, seeking to end Moscow's nearly four-year invasion.

The US-mediated talks are the latest chapter in the so far unsuccessful diplomatic effort to halt the war triggered by Russia's full-scale offensive in February 2022.

A first day of trilateral talks in the Emirati capital on Wednesday concluded with Kyiv describing the negotiations as "substantive and productive", though there was no apparent breakthrough.

The conflict is Europe's deadliest since World War II, with hundreds of thousands killed, millions forced to flee their homes and much of eastern and southern Ukraine left decimated.

Underscoring the human toll, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday that 55,000 of his country's troops had been killed, a rare assessment of battlefield losses by either side.

Russia has also stepped up strikes on Ukraine's power infrastructure, leaving many people, including residents of the capital Kyiv, without power and shivering through temperatures as low as minus 20C in recent days.

Ukraine's top negotiator Rustem Umerov said "concrete steps and practical solutions" had been discussed during the first day of the talks.

But the Kremlin repeated its hardline demand that Kyiv must give in, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov telling reporters the fighting would persist "until the Kyiv regime makes the appropriate decisions".

The main sticking point in the negotiations is the long-term fate of territory in eastern Ukraine.

Moscow is demanding that Kyiv pull its troops out of swathes of the Donbas, including heavily fortified cities atop vast natural resources, as a precondition of any deal.

It also wants international recognition that land seized in the invasion belongs to Russia.

Kyiv has said the conflict should be frozen along the current front line and has rejected a pull-back of forces.

Trilateral negotiations, which were first held January 23 and 24 in Abu Dhabi, are the most public sign of progress so far in US President Donald Trump's push to negotiate an end to the war.

His envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner have been sent to try to corral the sides into an agreement.

In Ukraine, foreign ministry spokesman Georgiy Tykhy said of the second round of talks that Kyiv was "interested in finding out what the Russians and Americans really want".

Putin 'only scared of Trump'

Zelensky said the US president's role would be crucial, telling French television in an interview broadcast Wednesday that "Putin is only scared of Trump".

Trump could use economic sanctions against Russia or transfer weapons to Ukraine to "maintain this pressure on Putin", Zelensky said, but added that Kyiv would not compromise on sovereignty.

Russia occupies around 20 percent of Ukraine. It claims the Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions as its own, and holds pockets of territory in at least three other Ukrainian regions in the east.

Kyiv still controls around one-fifth of the Donetsk region. It has warned that ceding ground will embolden Moscow, and that it will not sign a deal that fails to deter Russia from invading again.