30th March 2022 News: US deputy NSA is expected to visit Delhi this week

HT Daily News Wrap

Russia is moving its troops away from Kyiv as a strategic shift in its invasion into Ukraine: Pentagon, US deputy national security adviser Daleep Singh is expected to travel to New Delhi this week for meetings with Indian interlocutors, BJP national general secretary CT Ravi says that halal meat is part of an economic jihad and other top news in this bulletin.

Good morning! Here are the top stories in your morning news bulletin.

Russia is moving its troops away from Ukraine’s capital Kyiv as a strategic shift in its invasion into Ukraine and no one should be fooled to believe that it is withdrawing all its forces or suddenly reducing its attacks on Kyiv, the Pentagon said. “This is a repositioning, not a real withdrawal, and we all should now be prepared for a major offensive against other areas of Ukraine. It does not mean the threat to Kyiv is over,” Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said after Russia on Tuesday declared that it will be scaling down fighting around Kyiv following a fresh round of talks between Russia and Ukraine. Pentagon said Russia has failed in its objective of capturing Kyiv and subjugating Ukraine, but it can still very well attack Kyiv, as strikes are still going on. US deputy national security adviser Daleep Singh, who has played a key role in shaping American sanctions against Russia, is expected to travel to New Delhi this week for meetings with Indian interlocutors around the time of a visit by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov. The Indian-American official, who is deputy national security advisor for international economics and deputy director of the US National Economic Council, has helped design the punitive sanctions targeting President Vladimir Putin and his inner circle and Russian entities following the invasion of Ukraine. Singh is expected to be in the Indian capital for meetings on March 31, people familiar with the matter said on Tuesday. There was no official announcement from the Indian or American side regarding the visit, which is being seen as part of Washington’s efforts to nudge India to change its position on the Ukraine crisis. Singh is expected to interact with top officials of India’s National Security Council. North Korea tried to deceive the world about the type of missile it fired last week, claiming that it successfully tested a “huge,” new ICBM while actually firing off a rocket first launched in 2017, South Korean defense officials said. The intercontinental ballistic missile that North Korea launched last week was likely a Hwasong-15, which was successfully tested in November 2017 and designed to carry a single nuclear warhead, the South Korean defense ministry told lawmakers in a report Tuesday. That’s less advanced than the Hwasong-17, a multiple-warhead missile, which Pyongyang triumphantly declared a success with a slick, highly produced video. South Korean officials said the shadows in the video of the Hwasong-17 launch fell in a direction indicating the footage was shot between 8 a.m. and 10 a.m., rather than Thursday afternoon, when an ICBM rocketed into space and fell in the sea off of Japan. The cloud cover shown in the video also didn’t match the weather on the day of the launch, the officials said. Journalist Rana Ayyub was on Tuesday stopped at Mumbai international airport by immigration authorities while she was leaving for London. People familiar with the development said Rana Ayyub was detained on the basis of a look out circular (LOC) issued by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which is investigating her for laundering donations raised by her through online crowdfunding platform – Ketto – during Covid-19 pandemic. A senior ED official, requesting anonymity, said a LOC was issued against her as he failed to comply with a summon issued to her about a few weeks back. After she was stopped by the immigration authorities, ED was informed and a preliminary questioning was done by central anti-money laundering agency officers at the airport itself, said this officer. She has been asked to join the investigation at ED office on April 1, he said. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national general secretary CT Ravi on Tuesday said that halal meat is part of an “economic jihad” by the Muslim community. “Halal is an economic jihad. It has been put in place so that Muslims don’t do business with others, which has been forced upon them,” Ravi, the BJP legislator from Chikmagalur, said in Bengaluru on Tuesday. “How they (Muslims) feel that halal has to be imposed, the same way it is not wrong for others (right-wing groups) to say not to use it,” he added. The statements come a day after the Hindu Janajagruthi Samithi, a right-wing group, gave a clarion call to stop buying halal meat as animals culled in this process was done so by offering it to “Allah” and the same would be offensive if used by Hindus to offer to their gods. The ban on halal meat is being viewed as an extension of the ongoing onslaught against the Muslim population in the state which began to take shape after the hijab row and later manifested into restrictions against the community from taking part in Hindu religious fairs, people aware of developments said.

That’s all from us for now. We will be back with the evening news bulletin.