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The United States seized two sanctioned oil tankers linked to Venezuela in back-to-back actions in the North Atlantic and the Caribbean Sea, officials said Wednesday, and is removing sanctions to enable the shipping and sale of oil from the South American country to markets worldwide.

U.S. European Command announced the seizure of the merchant vessel Bella 1 for “violations of U.S. sanctions” in a social media post. The U.S. had been pursuing the tanker since last month after it tried to evade a U.S. blockade on sanctioned oil vessels around Venezuela.

Then, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem revealed that U.S. forces also took control of the tanker Sophia in the Caribbean. Noem said in a social media post both ships were “either last docked in Venezuela or en route to it.”

Noem said that both ships are part of a large “ghost fleet” of sanctioned vessels that carry oil from Russia, Iran and Venezuela in defiance of Western sanctions, mostly to customers in Asia.

The Trump administration is “selectively” removing sanctions to enable the shipping and sale of Venezuelan oil to global markets, according to an outline of the policies published Wednesday by the Energy Department.

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Ukraine's allies said Tuesday they had agreed to provide the country with multilayered international defense guarantees as part of a proposal to end Russia's nearly 4-year-old invasion of its neighbor.

At a key meeting in Paris, leaders from European countries and Canada, as well as U.S. representatives and top officials from the European Union and NATO, said they would provide Kyiv's front-line forces with equipment and training and back them up with air, land and sea support to deter any future Russian attack.

The size of the supporting forces was not made public, and many of the plan's details remain unclear.

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said the meeting made "excellent progress" but cautioned that "the hardest yards are still ahead," noting that Russian attacks on Ukraine continue.

He said allies will participate in U.S.-led monitoring and verification of any ceasefire, support the long-term provision of armaments for Ukraine's defense, and work toward binding commitments to support Ukraine in the case of any future attack by Russia.

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Lars Løkke Rasmussen, the foreign minister of Denmark, told reporters on Tuesday that he hopes Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, responds to a request from Greenland’s foreign minister, Vivian Motzfeldt, for the three of them to meet soon to discuss threats from Donald Trump to seize the Danish self-governing territory.

According to the Danish public broadcaster DR, Rasmussen said that such a meeting would give the Danes and Greenlanders a chance to correct what he called the false information Trump has used to argue that Greenland poses a threat to the security of the United States.

That misinformation, the foreign minister said, includes false claims that there are a lot of Russian and Chinese ships around Greenland, and that China exerts great influence there through investments.

“Greenland is covered with Russian and Chinese ships all over the place,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Sunday.

“We do not share this image that Greenland is plastered with Chinese investments,” Rasmussen said, “nor that there are Chinese warships up and down along Greenland”.

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The Israeli military carried out further strikes in areas of Gaza beyond its immediate control, in the latest violation of a ceasefire deal brokered by the US in October.

The attacks killed at least three Palestinians, including a 15-year-old boy, in and around Khan Younis and injured many more near the Bureij refugee camp, Al Jazeera reported.

Israeli forces also continued to demolish homes and infrastructure across northern and eastern Gaza, including Gaza City neighbourhoods, saying they were targeting militant facilities.

In southern Lebanon, meanwhile, an Israeli drone strike on Sunday killed two people after targeting a car near the town of Bint Jbeil, the Lebanese ministry of health said.

The attack reportedly occurred in the Ayn al-Mizrab area, destroying the vehicle and damaging nearby buildings.

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The Israeli army has spent the last 24 hours expanding the so-called 'yellow line' in eastern Gaza, particularly in the neighbourhoods of Tuffah, Shujayea and Zeitoun, also in eastern Gaza City, squeezing Palestinians into smaller and smaller groups in the enclave.

This is what Al-Jazeera reports, from its field staff. Israel now physically occupies more than 50% of the Gaza Strip, the Arab news outlet points out. The Israeli army's actions today are also pushing the army closer to the main artery of Salah al-Din Street, forcing displaced families sheltering near the area to flee, as more and more of them are under intense threat, while Israel's genocidal war against Gaza shows no sign of abating.

Intense artillery shelling and helicopter fire also resumed today, 5 January, in areas south of the besieged enclave, north and east of the towns of Rafah and Khan Younis.

On 4 January, Israel launched further attacks in areas of Gaza outside its direct military control, according to Al-Jazeera. At least three Palestinians were killed in several Israeli attacks in Khan Younis, according to medical sources. A five-storey building in central Gaza collapsed: it had been the target of Israeli shelling in late 2023. Civil Defence teams are searching for missing people under the rubble. The Wafa news agency reported that at least five people were injured.

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World leaders and top military officials are converging on the French capital Tuesday under growing doubt that a Western-backed peace plan for Ukraine can move beyond political symbolism and impose real costs on Moscow – or whether it risks becoming yet another diplomatic exercise overtaken by events on the battlefield.

The meeting, convened under the banner of the “Coalition of the Willing,” comes as Russian missiles continue to strike Ukrainian cities and as analysts warn that any agreement lacking enforcement mechanisms is unlikely to deter the Kremlin.

Ukrainian officials say the framework under discussion is “90 percent” complete. But that final 10%  – security guarantees, US buy-in and clear penalties for Russian violations – may ultimately determine whether the plan survives contact with reality.

“This week, we will be working with our European and American partners to ensure that Ukraine has the assistance it needs,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said Monday.https://www.kyivpost.com/post/67472

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