World
Arakan Army fighters claim control of key city in northwestern Myanmar
Lying along the Kaladar River in Chin State, Paletwa is a strategically important city on a major trade route.
The Arakan Army (AA), an armed ethnic group fighting as part of an alliance against the Myanmar military, has claimed control of a key western town near the border with India and Bangladesh.
The AA, which was in an uneasy truce with the military until late October, said it took full control of Paletwa in Chin State on Sunday afternoon, having overrun multiple military outposts.
“There is not a single military council camp left in the entire Palewa area,” it said in a statement on its media page, which was accompanied by photos showing AA soldiers posing with their weapons outside key administrative buildings adorned with the group’s flag as well as weapons, ammunition and military equipment it had seized.
“The entire Palewa region has been successfully controlled by [the] Rakhine Army,” the statement added.
There was no comment from the military on the situation in Paletwa, or any reports in state-run media.
The capture of Paletwa is another setback to the generals who are facing the biggest challenge since they seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in a coup in February 2021.
#AA 🎉declares #PaletwaVictory! Seizing the last ‘Hnamadar’ & ‘Khan Kha Taung,’ Paletwa is #SAC_free. “Mee Wa” seized after nearly 2 years of attacks. Today, Paletwa is AA-controlled. Salute Arakkha Soldiers for bravery, obedience and seamless cooperation. #3BHA#Operation1027 pic.twitter.com/IaCnenjHUa
— Operation 1027-3BHA (@operation1027) January 14, 2024
The AA claims to have about 30,000 troops and is part of the so-called Three Brotherhood Alliance with the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) and the Ta’Ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) that launched a major offensive against the military at the end of October.
Known as Operation 1027, the offensive has wrested control of key towns and military outposts near the border with China in the north and given renewed momentum to the anti-coup movement.
Dr Sasa, the minister of international cooperation in the National Unity Government set up by politicians removed in the coup, welcomed the AA capture of Paletwa.
“This is a significant success for the Nationwide Revolution, the Spring Revolution of Myanmar, the fight to free to entire population of Myanmar from the genocidal military dictatorship and to restore Myanmar to the path of an inclusive federal democratic Union for ALL,” he wrote on X.
42nd town to fall
The AA’s advance comes days after China announced it had brokered a ceasefire between the armed groups and the military in northern Shan State. A similar agreement in December quickly collapsed.
The AA has been fighting the military in Rakhine, where a brutal military crackdown on the Rohingya in 2017 is now the subject of a genocide case at the International Court of Justice, in an attempt to secure autonomy for its ethnic population.
Just before Myanmar’s national election in November 2020, the AA agreed to a truce with the military but when the generals seized power the AA’s political wing, the United League of Arakan (ULA), took the opportunity to extend and entrench its power in Rakhine and fighting resumed amid military concern at the AA’s growing power.
Chin State lies north of Rakhine and Paletwa is situated along the Kaladan River about 20km (12 miles) from the border with Bangladesh.
Nathan Ruser, an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s Cyber, Tech and Security programme, who has been mapping the advance of anti-coup forces, said the town was the 42nd nationwide to be captured from the military with 16 still being contested.
In addition, 25 battalion headquarters have been captured since the offensive started three months ago, “clearly marking the decisive shift towards offensive warfare by the resistance”, Ruser wrote on X.
The military coup triggered mass rallies demanding the restoration of civilian rule but when the military responded with brutal force, many protesters took up arms, joining forces with ethnic armed groups on the country’s borders.
The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a Myanmar advocacy group that has been tracking the crisis, says at least 4,363 civilians and pro-democracy activists have been killed by the military in the escalating violence, and nearly 20,000 people have been jailed by the regime.
World
Secret Service Agent Assigned to Jill Biden Shoots Self in Leg
A U.S. Secret Service agent assigned to former First Lady Jill Biden accidentally shot himself in the leg early on Friday near Philadelphia International Airport, according to a source familiar with the incident.
In a statement that did not mention Biden, the Secret Service said the incident occurred just after 8:30 a.m. EST and the agent suffered a non-life-threatening injury.
“There was no impact to the protectee’s movement and they were not present at the time of the incident,” the statement said.
The agent “accidentally discharged his firearm” while traveling in an unmarked SUV near the airport, Philadelphia Police Department Cpl. Jasmine Colón-Reilly said in a statement.
Emergency medical personnel responded to the scene and the agent was transported to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center in stable condition, Colón-Reilly said.
“The Secret Service’s Office of Professional Responsibility will be reviewing the facts and circumstances of this incident,” the Secret Service said.
The Secret Service is responsible for providing security to current and former presidents, vice presidents and their families and foreign leaders and is also an investigative agency.
—
(Reporting by Christian Martinez in Los Angeles; editing by Scott Malone and Chris Reese)
World
Body found in search for missing American Airlines flight attendant in Colombia: mayor
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A mayor in Colombia announced that a corpse had been discovered and was likely that of an American citizen who had gone missing.
Eric Fernando Gutierrez Molina, a 32-year-old American Airlines flight attendant from Texas, had gone missing while in the foreign country, according to reports.
“Since last Sunday, we have been searching for Eric Gutiérrez, a U.S. citizen who is missing,” Medellín Mayor Federico Gutiérrez noted in a Friday post on X, according to a translation from Spanish.
AMERICAN AIRLINES FLIGHT ATTENDANT VANISHES DURING COLOMBIA LAYOVER: ‘HIS FAMILY IS DESPERATE’
Medellin Mayor Federico Gutierrez speaks during a press conference on Dec. 19, 2025. (JAIME SALDARRIAGA / AFP via Getty Images)
“Unfortunately, a lifeless body has just been found between the municipality of Jericó and Puente Iglesias,” he noted.
“There is a very high probability that it is this person,” the mayor explained.
COLOMBIAN MILITARY PLANE CRASH KILLS AT LEAST 66, HEAD OF ARMED FORCES SAYS
Eric Fernando Gutierrez Molina (CDColExt/X)
“We are heartbroken by the tragic passing of our colleague,” American Airlines noted in a statement provided to Fox News Digital on Saturday.
‘AMERICAS COUNTER CARTEL COALITION’: INSIDE THE US STRATEGY TO COMBAT NARCO TERROR, CONFRONT CHINA, OTHER FOES
An American Airlines Airbus A321 departs from Harry Reid International Airport on March 11, 2026, in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Kevin Carter/Getty Images)
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“Our thoughts and support are with his family, loved ones and colleagues during this difficult time, and we are doing all we can to assist Colombian law enforcement in its investigation,” the company added.
Fox News Digital’s Alexandra Koch contributed to this report
World
Hundreds of thousands march through London in stand against the far right
London, United Kingdom – Hundreds of thousands of people have marched through central London in what organisers are calling the largest ever demonstration against the far right in British history.
The Together Alliance march, backed by about 500 groups including trade unions, antiracism campaigners and Muslim representative bodies, brought together a diverse crowd of all ages from across the country on Saturday, converging on Whitehall near the Houses of Parliament.
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Organisers said that half a million people took part.
Kevin Courtney, chairman of the Together Alliance, told crowds the march “gives us all confidence to carry on.”
London’s Metropolitan Police put the figure considerably lower, at approximately 50,000, though officers acknowledged it was difficult to reach an accurate figure given how spread out the crowds were.
The protest was met with a far smaller group of counterprotesters waving Israeli flags and Iran’s pre-1979 monarchical flag.
Aadam Muuse, a trade union activist, told Al Jazeera that racism and Islamophobia had moved from the fringes into mainstream politics, and was “being pushed by parliamentarians”.
He said the march was “much needed to push back against [Reform leader Nigel] Farage and his ilk,” adding that the populist party “must be defeated at the ballot box”.
Al Jazeera’s Milena Veselinovic, reporting from the march, said demonstrators were pushing back against what they saw as “the politics of hate and division” in the United Kingdom.
One demonstrator, activist and writer Hamja Ahsan, told Al Jazeera he was motivated to attend after a rally organised by the far-right agitator-activist Tommy Robinson that drew 150,000 people and was marred by violence that injured several police officers. Robinson is reportedly planning another rally in May.
“We need to show them that we’re the majority,” Ahsan said. “At a street level, the far right won’t take over our streets.”
He said the atmosphere on Saturday was akin to the Notting Hill Carnival, as the march united people from all backgrounds, “from pensioners to children”.
Museum worker Charlotte Elliston told Al Jazeera that she also feels unsettled by the far right’s creeping rise.
“You think this would never happen here, and then all of a sudden this might happen,” she said. “You see that it is getting scary.”
Several left-wing politicians joined the demonstration.
Independent MP Jeremy Corbyn posted on X that the “problems we face are not caused by migrants or refugees”, arguing they were rooted instead in “an economic system rigged in favour of corporations and billionaires”.
MP Zarah Sultana said on X, “There’s one minority we should be angry at: the billionaires funding division while working class people can’t make ends meet.”
Green Party leader Zack Polanski, Dianne Abbott and Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham were also among the crowds.
‘Historic demonstration’
The rights group Amnesty UK hailed the “historic demonstration”, saying marchers were “calling for a different vision of society – one which places dignity, compassion and human rights at its heart”.
A separate march organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, which assembled at Exhibition Road near Hyde Park, converged with the main demonstration during the afternoon.
Eighteen people were arrested outside New Scotland Yard on Saturday after staging a protest in support of Palestine Action, the protest group which remains proscribed under the Terrorism Act despite a High Court ruling in February that the government’s decision to ban it was unlawful.
The march comes amid rising racism as Farage’s Reform party surges in the polls.
Hope Not Hate, an antiracism campaign group, warned earlier in March that the British far right is now “bigger, bolder and more extreme than ever before”.
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