SRN NEWS

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s prime minister Wednesday visited a battered southern village as a Lebanese-Israeli agreement brokered by Washington appears to have started following a monthslong war. Nawaf Salam’s appearance in Zawtar Al Gharbieh comes a day after President Joseph Aoun’s landmark White House meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump, who promised to back the Lebanese government in its bid to claim state control across the country. Lebanon and Israel in late June signed the agreement, which calls for the Lebanese military to deploy in areas in southern Lebanon where Hezbollah had a military presence and influence, and from where Israeli troops that have occupied dozens of villages would withdraw. Both sides later agreed on a pilot zone made up of a series of villages to test the implementation of the agreement. While Israeli troops have struck and conducted ground operations in those towns and villages, none of them are under their occupation, but the Lebanese army has also not been there in large numbers. The latest war between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group started March 2, after the group fired rockets towards Israel in solidarity with war-torn Iran, its main backer. In response, Israel launched an aerial campaign and ground invasion in Lebanon, killing more than 4,000 people and displacing 1.2 million others. Lebanon’s top political leadership criticized Hezbollah for dragging the country into another war, but also condemned Israel for its widespread bombing and ground invasion. Salam, alongside Lebanon’s defense minister and senior military officials, pitched a Lebanese flag near a destroyed building in the town, vowing the government will start rebuilding destroyed homes and infrastructure. “We have insisted since the beginning that our goal is the complete Israeli withdrawal from all our territory,” Salam said. “What we are seeing today is just the beginning, but we remain determined and steadfast, and will continue to mobilize all political and diplomatic efforts to secure a full withdrawal from all of Lebanese territory.” Hezbollah has condemned the government for holding direct talks with Israel and rejected the agreement, but the militant group has not tried to sabotage it through military means. Its leadership believes Israel cannot be pressured to withdraw its troops by diplomatic means only, and that Lebanon lacks the leverage of its key ally Iran in negotiations. Trump, in his meeting with Aoun, did not speak much about the pilot zone going into its implementation phase, but pledged to support Lebanon without going into details. Aoun and the Lebanese government have urged the international community to invest in the tiny country and its army to help rebuild its infrastructure and military capacity. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukraine pushed on with its fight against Russia’s invasion under new military leadership Wednesday, after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy bowed to public pressure and fired his commander-in-chief. Ukraine has made significant progress in the war this year, and a rift between the country’s outgoing army chief and its defense minister threatened to derail its efforts. Both men lost their jobs following Zelenskyy’s major government reshuffle last week. The top-level changes late Tuesday were intended to draw a line under an unwelcome spasm of political turmoil that lasted almost a week and prompted rejoicing in Russia. The new army chief, 43-year-old Maj. Gen. Mykhailo Drapatyi, belongs to a new generation of Ukrainian generals who have come up through the ranks during the battle against Russian aggression. He became known for his daring and courage in 2014, the year that Russia seized and illegally annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula — eight years before Moscow’s all-out invasion. Zelenskyy said Drapatyi and other commanders must present an updated defense strategy, including continued reform of the corps system, faster weapon and drone deliveries, stronger air defense against Russian strikes, and a clearer mobilization plan. Zelenskyy met separately Tuesday with outgoing defense minister Mykhailo Fedorov, a 35-year-old tech-savvy entrepreneur credited with swiftly developing Ukraine’s drone technology that has given it a battlefield edge. Fedorov locked horns with outgoing commander-in-chief Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, a 60-year-old veteran trained in the Soviet Union before Ukraine’s independence. Street protests in Kyiv and other cities demanded Fedorov’s return, viewing him as a key military modernizer, and urged Zelenskyy to fire Syrskyi, regarded as part of the old guard. Zelenskyy offered Fedorov what he called a respected position in the government that would unify the country’s technology sector. It wasn’t clear if Fedorov accepted the offer — or whether the latest moves would satisfy protesters and calm the streets. Fedorov supported Drapatyi’s appointment, calling it a “new hope in the fight of free people for freedom and justice” and “a voice for change that could not go unheard.” Fedorov had criticized Syrskyi publicly before his dismissal, saying the general was blocking his reform efforts and needed to be replaced for Ukraine not to fail in its resistance against Russia. But Syrskyi defended his wartime record in a statement Wednesday. Among other things, he claimed Ukrainian forces had clawed back 743 square kilometers (287 square miles) of Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory this year and said he was handing his successor an army that was not only defending but also conducting offensive operations. It was not possible to independently verify his claim. Fedorov called Syrskyi to thank him for his military triumphs, including defending the Kyiv region at the time of Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion, the Kharkiv counteroffensive operation later that year and other battles, calling them “already an important part of Ukraine’s history.” But he added that the country must “move even faster and write new chapters, correcting all previous mistakes.” The political crisis began last Thursday, when Zelenskyy overhauled his wartime government, replacing his prime minister and firing Fedorov after just six months in the post. The reshuffle immediately drew thousands of protesters into the streets of Kyiv and other cities, framing Fedorov’s removal as Zelenskyy siding with an entrenched military old guard over a reformer. Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones overnight struck two more sprawling warehouses of Russia’s major online retailer, Wildberries, in Russia’s southern regions of Krasnodar and Stavropol, Wildberries founder Tatyana Kim and Russian officials said Wednesday. The strikes came four days after Ukraine’s long-range drones hit massive Wildberries warehouses in the Moscow region and in the Tambov region, killing eight people and wounding dozens, according to officials. Zelenskyy said Saturday said that the facilities were used by Russia to supply sanctioned components for the production of drones and navigation equipment. ___ Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

GUWAHATI, India (AP) — Toxic gas prevented rescuers from reaching 13 workers trapped in a collapsed hydropower tunnel in India on Wednesday after a gas explosion two days earlier killed 12 workers. The blast triggered by a buildup of methane gas tore through the tunnel Monday at the 500-megawatt Teesta Hydroelectric Project in northeastern Sikkim state in the Himalayas. Authorities have recovered the bodies of 12 workers who died inside the tunnel about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the state capital Gangtok. Rescue teams equipped with specialized breathing equipment and night-vision gear were having difficulty entering the tunnel because of the gas and a buildup of water, administrative official Anupama Tamling said. The Teesta River basin, where the hydropower project is being built, lies in a seismically active region marked by young, fragile rock formations riddled with fractures and underground pockets that can trap ancient gases. Fragile mountains, seismic activity and unpredictable underground conditions make tunnel projects especially risky in the region, according to experts. A February explosion in a coal mine in neighboring Meghalaya state killed 18 workers. A tunnel section collapsed in 2023 in northern Uttarakhand state, trapping 41 workers for 17 days before they were rescued. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Volunteers armed with chisels, brushes and protective goggles chip away at rock encasing the bones of a massive prehistoric amphibian in a glass-walled laboratory on the ground floor of Warsaw’s Copernicus Science Centre. On the other side of the wall, visitors watch the work unfold on the bones of the nearly six-meter (20-foot)-long skeleton. Children point with excitement while parents contemplate the creature the massive bones once belonged to. The painstaking restoration is part of an unusual public science project. More than 2,000 volunteers are helping Polish scientists restore the skeleton of the Mastodonsaurus, a fearsome aquatic predator from around the dawn of the dinosaur age. The work is meticulous. Bone must be separated from surrounding rock millimeter by millimeter with a pneumatic chisel, whose needle gently breaks away rock while ultraviolet light reveals where the bone ends and the surrounding rock begins. The volunteers are managers, cleaners, tattoo artists — not geologists or paleontologists. They receive training and special protective gear, before they begin two-hour-long chiseling sessions under supervision. “I imagine that those bones were lying underground for 240 million years and I am the first human on earth to touch them,” said Tatyana Kozyk, the coordinator of the volunteer teams. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around this experience.” One of the largest amphibians ever to exist, the Mastodonsaurus lived about 240 million years ago during the Middle Triassic, while the earliest dinosaurs were appearing but before they came to dominate Earth. It was an underwater ambush hunter, preying mainly on fish and smaller amphibians. Scientists believe it could grow to nearly six meters (20 feet) in length. It had a broad, flat head, long jaws and sharp conical teeth, its appearance resembling a crocodile’s, though it belonged to a different branch of the vertebrate family tree. When the restoration is complete, it will be the largest exhibited in a museum anywhere in the world, said Tomasz Sulej, a paleontologist and professor at the Institute of Paleobiology at the Polish Academy of Sciences. Its skeleton weighs 1,300 kilograms (2,865 pounds). Sulej and his colleague Wojciech Pawlak from the Faculty of Geology at the Warsaw University are credited with discovering the skeleton in southern Poland in 2023 and coming up with the idea to invite volunteers to help with its restoration. Sulej says there are no other known Mastodonsaurus skeletons this large anywhere else in the world, and the discovery promises to help scientists learn more about the species. “The structure of the body is different from what we knew so far,” he said. “This is information that is completely new to the scientific world.” Other Mastodonsaurus skeletons have been found elsewhere, including in Germany and Russia, Sulej said, but they are around 2 to 3 meters (6½ to 10 feet) long. Dorota Serafin, a 51-year-old manager from Warsaw who volunteers for the project, said working with the skeleton of an ancient animal is an experience that is at the same time “relaxing and philosophical, even mystical.” Serafin said she plans to return for other sessions and eventually bring her family to Copernicus when the restored skeleton is exhibited, which is expected to happen in October or November. In addition to the startling experience of touching the remains of an animal that lived hundreds of millions of years ago, contact with the Mastodonsaurus offers an opportunity to reflect on the future, those involved in the project said. The amphibian inhabited Earth’s waters after the largest known mass extinction and just before the dinosaurs appeared. As humanity contemplates the potentially catastrophic effects of climate change, Sulej says the story of the Mastodonsaurus offers some hope. “The Mastodonsaurus lived after the great extinction, which shows one thing, that nature always manages,” Sulej said. “It’s not true that humans can destroy life on this planet. Nature and life always find ways to survive.” Brought to you by www.srnnews.com

Communities on the U.S. Gulf Coast distributed sandbags and closed beaches as Tropical Storm Bertha threatened to bring flooding and strong winds Wednesday from the Florida Panhandle to Louisiana. Bertha was forecast to make landfall Wednesday night in the coastal and lightly populated part of Louisiana southeast of New Orleans, with wind as the biggest threat, according to Michael Buchanan, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Louisiana. Early Wednesday, the storm was centered about 145 miles (235 kilometers) west-southwest of Panama City, Florida, and 75 miles (120 kilometers) east of the mouth of the Mississippi River. It was moving west at 6 mph (9 kph) with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 kph), the Miami-based National Hurricane Center said. A tropical storm warning was in effect from the line between Bay and Gulf counties in Florida west to Morgan City, Louisiana, as well as for metropolitan New Orleans and Lake Pontchartrain, the hurricane center said. Storm surges up to 4 feet (1.2 meters) were possible in Louisiana from the Mississippi River mouth to the Alabama-Mississippi state line, with smaller surges in parts of Florida and Alabama, forecasters said. Rain between 2 to 4 inches (5 to 10 centimeters) could fall from western Florida to the southern Louisiana coastline, with higher amounts in scattered areas that could cause flash flooding in urban areas. Bertha was expected to weaken as it pushes into Texas, forecasters said. Authorities in Mississippi, Louisiana and Florida opened sites to provide sandbags to residents while red flag warnings were posted along some beaches advising swimmers about the dangers of rip tides. Up and down the coast, double red flags signaled that Gulf waters were closed for swimming. Beaches near Pensacola, Florida, were mostly deserted except for tourists taking photos of the pounding surf. “For locals, this is just another storm,” said Candice Henderson, manager of the Crab Trap, a beachside restaurant that was packed Tuesday on Pensacola’s Perdido Key. “When you’re on vacation and it’s raining, you either shop or you go out to eat.” Bertha is the second tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. Tropical Storm Arthur in June brought heavy rainfall to the southeastern U.S. Bertha could dump heavy rain on coastal areas of Mississippi that are still recovering from flooding brought by Arthur that destroyed and damaged homes. “Because of that, people are definitely paying attention, or at least you would hope so,” said Jeff Clark, a spokesperson for Mississippi’s Harrison County, where six sites were open for sandbag distribution. There had not been a need by Tuesday to open shelters or order evacuations, Clark said. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration expects a below-average Atlantic hurricane season this year, although that doesn’t eliminate the chances of a catastrophic storm. In the eastern Pacific Ocean, Hurricane Fausto churned far from land Tuesday. The hurricane was about 805 miles (1,295 kilometers) west-southwest of the southern tip of Baja California moving west-northwest at 9 mph (15 kph) with maximum sustained winds of 80 mph (130 kph). It was forecast to gradually strengthen and the hurricane center warned that ocean swells generated by Fausto could cause life-threatening surf and rip tide conditions on the Baja California coast. ___ Associated Press journalists Kimberly Chandler in Montgomery, Alabama, Stephen Smith in New Orleans and Haya Panjwani in Washington contributed to this report. Brought to you by www.srnnews.com