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Photo: Roman Chop / AP
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1. Ukraine lowers minimum draft age to 25
Ukraine lowered its minimum draft age on Wednesday from 27 to 25 to bolster its beleaguered military for its ongoing war with Russia. A previous estimate saying that the country needed 500,000 new soldiers was wrong, according to a recent audit. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not yet said exactly how many soldiers are needed.
Only about a third of Ukraine’s male population between the ages of 25 and 60 are eligible to be drafted into the war effort, about 3.7 million men out of a pool of 11.1 million, according to the Financial Times.
The three measures Zelenskyy signed into law on Wednesday also eliminate a medical exemption category called “partially eligible” and create an electronic database of all Ukrainian males 17 or older.
Related: On Wednesday, NATO members were set to discuss a “Trump-proof” military aid package for Ukraine. The five-year, $100 billion plan is meant to secure funding ahead of a possible second term for Trump, who’s long been critical of NATO.
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2. More aid groups halt work in Gaza following deadly attack on World Central Kitchen
Several humanitarian groups are suspending operations in the Gaza Strip following Israeli airstrikes that killed six World Central Kitchen aid workers and their driver on Monday.
Project Hope and Anera announced on Tuesday that, as World Central Kitchen did, they would pause their operations in Gaza, citing their workers’ safety. “The blatant nature of the attack on WCK’s convoy has proven that aid workers are currently under attack,” said Anera spokesperson Steve Fake.
Days before the deadly airstrikes, WCK had reported to the Israeli military that an Israeli Defense Forces sniper had fired into one of their cars.
President Joe Biden joined in the condemnation of the attack on Tuesday, saying in a statement, “Incidents like yesterday’s simply should not happen.” The Biden administration is currently pushing Congress to approve the sale of $18 billion worth of F-15 fighter jets to Israel.
As of March 20, nearly 200 aid workers had died in Gaza since the start of the war, according to U.N. data. That is nearly triple the next-highest number of aid worker casualties the U.N. has recorded in a single year of any other conflict.
The absence of meals delivered by Anera and WCK — 150,000 and 170,000 per day, respectively — will likely worsen an already catastrophic crisis. Experts from USAID warned White House officials on Tuesday that the hunger and malnutrition Gazans are being subjected to is “unprecedented in modern history,” and starvation deaths will “accelerate in the weeks ahead.”
In other Israel-Gaza news: Israel war cabinet member Benny Gantz called for elections to take place in September, ahead of schedule, amid protests demanding Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s resignation.
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3. Taiwan was well prepared for earthquake
Taiwan was hit by a 7.2- to 7.4-magnitude earthquake during morning rush hour on Wednesday, the strongest the island has seen in 25 years. At least nine people were killed and over 1,000 injured.
Despite the earthquake’s strength, experts have noted that the resulting destruction could have been much worse had Taiwan not been so well prepared.
“Taiwan’s earthquake preparedness is among the most advanced in the world,” said Stephen Gao, a seismologist and professor at Missouri University of Science and Technology. Gao attributes this to “strict building codes, a world-class seismological network, and widespread public education campaigns on earthquake safety.”
Earthquakes are not uncommon in Taiwan, which lies along the “Ring of Fire,” the line of seismic faults around the Pacific Ocean.
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In other news
- Scottish police said on Tuesday that JK Rowling’s most recent comments — saying trans women aren’t women — aren’t criminal. The “Harry Potter” author’s posts on the social media platform X were seemingly meant to test Scotland’s new Hate Crime and Public Order Act. [Deadline]
- A conservation group has bought about 67,000 acres of virgin Romanian forest — and is eyeing more — in the hopes of creating a “European Yellowstone.” The area is home to wolves, brown bears, lynx, and beavers, and several years ago, dozens of bison were reintroduced to the region. [El País]
- No more monkey business: Local authorities have developed a plan to round up 2,500 macaques that have run amok in the central Thai city of Lopburi for years, snatching food from and sometimes injuring their fellow primates, humans. [Associated Press]
- According to a report published on Tuesday, Amazon is ditching “Just Walk Out” at its Amazon Fresh grocery stores, a proprietary service that allowed customers to skip checkout lines. The system appeared to be completely automated, but it allegedly relied on more than 1,000 people in India watching videos to ensure accuracy. [The Information]
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Say that again
“Of course it’s really sad because, for bookworms like me, a place is missing — a holy place is missing — in Hong Kong,” said Hancock, a customer of Mount Zero. It’s the latest independent bookstore in Hong Kong to close its doors amid increased scrutiny under a new national security law that would allow the government to more easily crush dissent in the region. [Deutsche Welle]
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‘To be honest, it was scary’
Ukraine is one of the most mine-laden countries in the world. Meet 24-year-old Anna, whose job it is to get rid of them.
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What we’re listening to
It’s hard to describe the songs on “Souvenirs,” the first vocal album from the late Ethiopian nun and composer Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru. Something about their spartan sound — just a piano and Gebru’s haunting voice recorded to fuzzy cassette — activates in me a sense of bracing melancholy that almost precludes language.
Gebru wrote and recorded “Souvenirs” from 1977 to 1985 during a time of political turmoil in Ethiopia, and in it she mourns the loss of her homeland and seems to presage her future exile in Jerusalem.
All of the songs, reissued this February, are beautiful and deeply moving, so I’d recommend starting at the beginning with “Clouds Moving on the Sky” and listening all the way through.
—Laura Adamczyk, staff writer
Thanks for reading. We’ll see you tomorrow.
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Hope O'Dell contributed writing and reporting to today's newsletter. Questions, comments, or corrections? Email us at theoverview@globalaffairs.org.
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