Pope Francis died Monday morning, Cardinal Kevin Ferrell, the Vatican camerlengo, announced.“At 7:35 this morning, the Bishop of Rome, Francis, returned to the home of the Father.
Day: April 21, 2025
Ukrainian air force says Russia launched 96 drones and three missiles in overnight attacks hours after ceasefire declared by Putin ended
Welcome back to our live coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Ukraine’s military has reported Russian drone attacks on several regions overnight, hours after the 30 hour “Easter ceasefire” declared by Vladimir Putin came to an end.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed Vladimir Putin’s Easter ceasefire declaration as a fake “PR” exercise and said Russian troops had continued their drone and artillery attacks across many parts of the frontline on Sunday.
Washington said it would welcome an extension of the truce, and Zelenskyy said Ukraine would pause strikes for 30 days. Putin, however, did not give orders to extend the 30 hour truce beyond Sunday.
Donald Trump used the situation to claim that a breakthrough was within a few days’ reach. “Hopefully Russia and Ukraine will make a deal this week,” he posted on Sunday. “Both will then start to do big business with the United States of America, which is thriving, and make a fortune.” On Friday, Trump said he would end US peace efforts unless the two sides showed movement.
Russia’s Voronezh region that borders Ukraine was under air raid alerts for two hours overnight, the region’s governor said on Telegram.
Russia’s defence ministry said on Sunday that Ukrainian forces had shot at Russian positions 444 times and said it had counted more than 900 Ukrainian drone attacks, saying also that there were deaths and injuries among the civilian population.
Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari led a successful legal battle to protect the Marañon River in the Peruvian Amazon
An Indigenous campaigner and women’s leader from the Peruvian Amazon has been awarded the prestigious Goldman prize for environmental activists, after leading a successful legal campaign that led to the river where her people, the Kukama, live being granted legal personhood.
Mari Luz Canaquiri Murayari, 57, from the village of Shapajila on the Marañon River, led the Huaynakana Kamatahuara Kana (HKK) women’s association, supported by lawyers from Peru’s Legal Defence Institute, in a campaign to protect the river. After three years, judges in Loreto, Peru’s largest Amazon region, ruled in March 2024 that the Marañon had the right to be free-flowing and free of contamination, respecting an Indigenous worldview that regards a river as a living entity.
