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The UK government has distanced itself from US President Joe Biden’s apparent call for regime change in Moscow when he said that Russian leader Vladimir Putin “cannot remain in power”.
Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi said any decision to overthrow Mr Putin for his invasion of Ukraine would be “up to the Russian people” after Mr Biden’s apparently unscripted call caused the White House to quickly pull back from the remark.
In a highly charged speech in Warsaw, Mr Biden appealed to Russian people directly with comparisons between the invasion of Ukraine and the horrors of the Second World War.
“For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power,” he said at the close of his speech about the Russian president, who he earlier described as a “butcher”.
As rockets struck the city of Lviv near the Polish border in the west of Ukraine, Mr Biden said: “If you’re able to listen – you, the Russian people, are not our enemy.”
But a White House official swiftly tried to clarify, saying the US president’s point was that the Russian leader “cannot be allowed to exercise power over his neighbours or the region”.
US secretary of state Antony Blinken insisted “we do not have a strategy of regime change” as the Kremlin said it was “not up to the Americans to decide who will remain in power in Russia”.
French President Emanuel Macron said “he wouldn’t use those terms” voiced by Mr Biden and suggested they could make it harder to resolve the conflict.
"We want to stop the war that Russia launched in Ukraine, without waging war and without escalation,” Mr Macron said.
Richard Haass, a veteran US diplomat who is president of the Council on Foreign Relations think tank, said Mr Biden’s remarks made “a dangerous situation more dangerous” when the strategy should be focused on de-escalation.
Mr Zahawi said it was “for the Russian people to decide how they are governed” but suggested they “would certainly do well” to have someone who “is democratic and understands their wishes”.
“That’s up to the Russian people and it is only the Russian people that can make that decision,,” he told the BBC on Sunday morning.
"I suspect most of them are pretty fed up with Putin and his cronies and the illegal war."
But Mr Zahawi declined to criticise Mr Biden, unlike Tobias Ellwood, the Conservative MP who chairs the House of Commons defence committee, who said Mr Putin would now “spin this, dig in and fight harder”.
Asked if Mr Biden was wrong to issue the call, Mr Zahawi told Sky News: “No, what I’m saying to you is the White House has been very clear on this.
"The president gave a very powerful speech on this and I think both the United States and the United Kingdom agree that it’s up to the Russian people to decide who should be governing them.”
He backed UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss in saying sanctions against oligarchs, banks and businesses could be lifted if Mr Putin ended the war and committed to “no further aggression”.
With the Kremlin’s troops struggling, Ms Truss's comments will be seen as a possible incentive for Mr Putin to cut his losses and broker a deal with Ukraine.
“Those sanctions should only come off with a full ceasefire and withdrawal, but also commitments that there will be no further aggression," she told the Sunday Telegraph.
“And also, there’s the opportunity to have snapback sanctions if there is further aggression in future. That is a real lever that I think can be used.”
Moscow has indicated that it could scale back its offensive to focus on what it claimed was the “main goal, the liberation of Donbas”, the region bordering Russia in the east of Ukraine.
But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he would not give up territory in peace talks as he noted that his troops had delivered “powerful blows” to invading forces.
Mr Zahawi said that the Russian military was having “real problems” as the Ukrainians have “fought like lions”.
The latest intelligence update from the Ministry of Defence said that the Kremlin’s forces “appear to be concentrating their effort to attempt the encirclement of Ukrainian forces” in the east of the country.
“The battlefield across northern Ukraine remains largely static with local Ukrainian counter-attacks hampering Russian attempts to reorganise their forces,” the ministry said.
Mr Zelenskyy renewed his plea for western allies to provide tanks and fighter jets to repel the Russians, as he praised the courage of his troops defending the besieged city of Mariupol.
“If only those who have been thinking for 31 days on how to hand over dozens of jets and tanks had 1 per cent of their courage,” he said.
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Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
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Rating: 2.5/5
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"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
The specs
Price, base / as tested Dh12 million
Engine 8.0-litre quad-turbo, W16
Gearbox seven-speed dual clutch auto
Power 1479 @ 6,700rpm
Torque 1600Nm @ 2,000rpm 0-100kph: 2.6 seconds 0-200kph: 6.1 seconds
Top speed 420 kph (governed)
Fuel economy, combined 35.2L / 100km (est)
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Sharrie Williams
The American singer is hugely respected in blues circles due to her passionate vocals and songwriting. Born and raised in Michigan, Williams began recording and touring as a teenage gospel singer. Her career took off with the blues band The Wiseguys. Such was the acclaim of their live shows that they toured throughout Europe and in Africa. As a solo artist, Williams has also collaborated with the likes of the late Dizzy Gillespie, Van Morrison and Mavis Staples.
Lin Rountree
An accomplished smooth jazz artist who blends his chilled approach with R‘n’B. Trained at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC, Rountree formed his own band in 2004. He has also recorded with the likes of Kem, Dwele and Conya Doss. He comes to Dubai on the back of his new single Pass The Groove, from his forthcoming 2018 album Stronger Still, which may follow his five previous solo albums in cracking the top 10 of the US jazz charts.
Anita Williams
Dubai-based singer Anita Williams will open the night with a set of covers and swing, jazz and blues standards that made her an in-demand singer across the emirate. The Irish singer has been performing in Dubai since 2008 at venues such as MusicHall and Voda Bar. Her Jazz Garden appearance is career highlight as she will use the event to perform the original song Big Blue Eyes, the single from her debut solo album, due for release soon.
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Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.
The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.
Blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Due to the inability to tamper with transactions, advocates say this makes the currency more secure and safer than traditional systems. It is maintained by a network of people referred to as ‘miners’, who receive rewards for solving complex mathematical equations that enable transactions to go through.
However, one of the major problems that has come to light has been the presence of illicit material buried in the Bitcoin blockchain, linking it to the dark web.
Other blockchain platforms can offer things like smart contracts, which are automatically implemented when specific conditions from all interested parties are reached, cutting the time involved and the risk of mistakes. Another use could be storing medical records, as patients can be confident their information cannot be changed. The technology can also be used in supply chains, voting and has the potential to used for storing property records.
The specs
Engine: 6.2-litre V8
Power: 502hp at 7,600rpm
Torque: 637Nm at 5,150rpm
Transmission: 8-speed dual-clutch auto
Price: from Dh317,671
On sale: now
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Cricket World Cup League Two
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Al Amerat, Muscat
Results
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Wednesday January 8 –Oman v Namibia
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Saturday January 11 – UAE v Namibia
Sunday January 12 – Oman v Namibia
Lexus LX700h specs
Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh590,000
