Dmytro Kozianynskyi was still acclimating to his reentry into civilian life after three years of military service when he read in July about a proposed law that would gut Ukraine’s independent anti-corruption institutions.

“I thought, ‘This is not what I fought in this existential war for,’” says the veteran, who now works at a Kyiv nonprofit providing rehabilitation for wounded soldiers. “I thought this law would be against our integration into Europe and the future I see for Ukraine.”

So Mr. Kozianynskyi turned to his blog, where he asked his 12,000 social media followers to consider joining him the next day in central Kyiv in a peaceful protest against the proposed legislation.

Why We Wrote This

Many Ukrainians lament that the scandal in the president’s inner circle is a reminder that a corrupt culture still lurks in the halls of power. Yet many are encouraged that the anti-corruption apparatus was strong enough to pursue the powerful.

The response astounded even Mr. Kozianynskyi.

In what was Ukraine’s first major protest since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, thousands of Ukrainians, mostly young people, filled a square not far from Maidan, the historic public space that was ground zero for Ukraine’s 2013 pro-democracy revolution.

By Day 2, the crowd swelled to more than 10,000 people.

“I thought I would be happy if a few people from my social bubble joined me,” he says. “But it was amazing to see that thousands of people felt strongly enough about this issue to answer the call.

“It really showed me, and I think the world,” he adds, “how important this battle against corruption is to Ukrainian people.”

A shaken government scuttled the proposed law, leaving the country’s two primary anti-corruption institutions intact and, crucially, independent.

Blow to Zelenskyy

The significance of the victory in the summer’s “battle against corruption,” as Mr. Kozianynskyi calls it, was underscored in November when a giant energy sector kickback scandal detonated in President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s inner circle of aides and close advisers.

According to the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, one of the independent agencies the defeated legislation would have weakened, senior officials – including Mr. Zelenskyy’s powerful confidant and business partner Tymur Mindich – skimmed some $100 million from contracts to fortify the battered energy sector.

By the end of November, the investigation also took down Mr. Zelenskyy’s closest adviser, Andriy Yermak.

The erupting scandal was a blow to Mr. Zelenskyy just as he was pressing Ukraine’s case in talks with international partners over U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposed peace plan to end Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine. Mr. Yermak had been leading Ukraine’s delegation in talks with the Trump administration.

European leaders in particular cautioned Mr. Zelenskyy that they would have an increasingly difficult time convincing their constituents to support substantial aid packages for a country seen to be rife with corruption.

“They do have a massive corruption situation going on there [in Ukraine],” Mr. Trump told reporters this month.

For Ukrainians themselves, the corruption scandal is something of a double-edged sword.

Yes, many lament, this scandal now dubbed “Mindichgate” is a sobering reminder that a culture of corruption that took hold under the Soviet Union still lurks in the halls of power. More disheartening still is how this case involves the energy sector and money intended in part for repairs to keep the lights and heat on just as Ukrainians face a harsh winter of intensified Russian attacks on the sector.

The system worked

But on the other hand, many Ukrainians find solace in the fact that the country’s anti-corruption apparatus not only functioned and withstood efforts to dismantle it, but has proved strong enough to pursue even some of the country’s most powerful.

“There’s no question that this is a bad scandal. It’s discouraging and damaging for all of us in Ukraine,” says Iryna Podolyak, a former member of Parliament who is now director of development and investigative projects at independent anti-corruption center NGL.media in Lviv.

“But the positive side of something very bad is that we have seen because of it that the country’s anti-corruption infrastructure works pretty well. And that functioning of public institutions has encouraged people to see this as our fight,” she adds. “It’s a fight for what Ukraine will look like after the war.”

This split-screen perspective that finds “Mindichgate” to be simultaneously disheartening and encouraging is widespread in Ukraine.

“Many people have taken the news of this scandal and then the way it has developed and concluded that we are facing a paradox,” says Volodymyr Fesenko, director of the Penta Center for Political Studies in Kyiv. “They see that a deeply rooted system of corruption is still with us,” he says. “But at the same time they see the anti-corruption infrastructure of Ukraine’s democracy working and able to reach the very top of the country’s power structure.”

What kind of long-term blow the scandal will deal to Ukraine’s international reputation remains to be seen. But overall perceptions of corruption in Ukraine have been slowly ameliorating over the decade since the democratic revolution.

Transparency International’s respected Corruption Perceptions Index, which gauges perceived levels of public sector corruption, shows Ukraine’s score improving over the past 10 years – although it did dip slightly in 2023.

Main problem is still the war

Many analysts say there is a strong desire for more than gradual progress, however – something closer to an anti-corruption revolution – but that the war is tempering public demands for internal progress when the top priority is confronting an external enemy.

“People realize that the country needs to find a balance,” Mr. Fesenko says. “There’s an understanding that we can’t be fighting an internal political war at the same time as we are in a full war with Russia.”

Ms. Podolyak puts it this way: “Most people realize that right now Ukraine’s main problem is not corruption, it’s the war with an enemy who wants to erase our existence,” she says. “If we don’t survive as a state, it doesn’t matter if we are corrupt or not.”

As for Mr. Kozianynskyi, the soldier who may have saved Ukraine’s anti-corruption institutions with his summer protests, events have convinced him that the country is able to fight corruption and an “existential” war at the same time.

“I think we’ve learned that our society is mature enough to support and demand a strong anti-corruption effort even as we fight a war,” Mr. Kozianynskyi says.

Deepen your worldview

with Monitor Highlights.

Already a subscriber? Log in to hide ads.

“I know some people say that exposing the dirty actions of some officials in high places only feeds the Russian disinformation claims that Ukraine is a corrupt country,” he adds. “But for me, the way our institutions have worked to expose the corruption is the best answer to Putin.”

Oleksandr Naselenko supported reporting for this story.

Thailand and Cambodia have agreed to hold a meeting of defence officials later this week as regional leaders push for an end to deadly violence along the two countries’ shared border.

Thailand’s Foreign Minister Sihasak Phuangketkeow announced the planned talks on Monday after a special meeting in Kuala Lumpur of Southeast Asian foreign ministers, who were trying to salvage a ceasefire.

Recommended Stories

That truce was first brokered by Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) chair Malaysia and United States President Donald Trump after cross-border fighting broke out in July.

Sihasak told reporters that this week’s discussions would be held on Wednesday in Thailand’s Chanthaburi, within the framework of an existing bilateral border committee.

But just hours after the regional crisis talks were held in Malaysia, Cambodia’s Ministry of Defence said the Thai military deployed fighter jets to bomb areas of Siem Reap and Preah Vihear provinces.

The Thai army said Cambodia had fired dozens of rockets into Thailand, with Bangkok’s air force responding with air strikes on two Cambodian military targets.

Thailand and Cambodia have engaged in daily exchanges of rocket and artillery fire along their 817km (508-mile) land border following the collapse of the truce, with fighting at multiple points stretching from forested regions near Laos to the coastal provinces of the Gulf of Thailand.

Despite the cross-border fire, Cambodia’s Ministry of Interior said it remains “optimistic that the Thai side will demonstrate sincerity” in implementing a ceasefire.

Thailand’s Sihasak, however, cautioned that the upcoming meeting may not immediately produce a truce. “Our position is a ceasefire does not come with an announcement, but must come from actions,” he said.

His ministry said the two nations’ militaries would “discuss implementation, related steps and verification of the ceasefire in detail”.

The planned meeting comes as ASEAN on Monday urged both countries to show “maximum restraint and take immediate steps towards the cessation of all forms of hostilities”.

In a statement after the talks in Kuala Lumpur, ASEAN also called on both Thailand and Cambodia to “restore mutual trust and confidence, and to return to dialogue”.

ASEAN members also reiterated their concerns over the ongoing conflict and “called upon both parties to ensure that civilians residing in the affected border areas are able to return, without obstruction and in safety and dignity, to their homes”.

Canada has named former BlackRock executive Mark Wiseman as the new ambassador to the United States, with upcoming trade and tariff negotiations likely to dominate his tenure.

In a statement on Monday, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said that Wiseman would help manage Canada’s relationship with the US, which has grown stormy under tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump.

Recommended Stories

“Mr Wiseman will be a key contributor to the government’s efforts to advance Canada-US priorities, including secure borders [and] a strengthened trade and investment relationship,” Carney said in a statement.

Relations between the countries have somewhat settled after the US launched a trade war targeting Canadian goods, prompting anger at what was widely viewed as an act of economic hostility against a longtime ally.

The Trump administration has targeted Canada with several rounds of tariffs, including a blanket 25 percent tariff for allegedly failing to stem migration and fentanyl flows from Canada.

That came despite data showing only a tiny fraction of fentanyl smuggled into the US crosses the US-Canada border.

The US subsequently imposed sweeping tariffs on automobiles, steel and aluminium imports, all of which disproportionately affected Canada.

In August, Trump and Carney, who was elected on a promise to take a tough stance in the face of US threats, reached agreements to roll back some of the measures. A more comprehensive deal has remained elusive.

Trump has also stirred anger by repeatedly saying that Canada should become the 51st US state, which Carney has firmly rejected.

Those tensions could re-emerge in the coming months as officials set out to renegotiate the terms of the US-Mexico-Canada free trade agreement, also known as the USMCA.

Canadian officials are set to begin discussions with US counterparts in mid-January on the USMCA, which currently exempts many key products that would otherwise be tariffed under Trump’s policies.

Canada is the top export destination for 36 US states, with nearly $2.7bn worth of goods and services crossing the border each day.

Carney has hedged his expectations for the future of trade relations with the US, saying that Canada will defend its economic interests but that US policy is beyond its control.

Can diplomacy end the conflict between Thailand and Cambodia?

The neighbouring countries hold their first direct meeting in regional push for peace.

Save

New York City, United States – Since the recent termination of the nearly decade-old trade rule called “de minimis,” United States consumers and businesses have been exposed to slower shipping, destroyed packages and steep tariff fees on international goods – foreshadowing what could make for a chaotic holiday shopping season.

For major international carrier UPS, navigating the latest regulatory changes has proved more fraught than for its competitors FedEx and DHL.

Recommended Stories

Matthew Wasserbach, brokerage manager for Express Customs Clearance in New York, a firm that assists importers with documentation, tariff classifications, valuation, and other federal requirements, has witnessed the fallout as UPS customers seek his firm’s assistance to clear packages entering the US.

“Over the last few months, we’ve been seeing a lot of UPS shipments, in particular, becoming stuck and being lost or disposed of … This all stems from the ending of the de minimis,” said Wasserbach. “Their [UPS’s] whole business model changed once the de minimis was ended. And they just didn’t have the capacity to do the clearance … a lot of people are expecting to receive international packages, and they’re just never gonna get them.”

UPS did not respond to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.

Suspending tariff exemptions

Since 2016, the de minimis trade exemption determined that packages worth $800 or less were not subject to taxes and tariffs. According to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the number of shipments entering the US claiming the exemption increased by more than 600 percent from 139 million shipments in 2015 to more than one billion in 2023.

In August, this all changed. President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending de minimis treatment for all countries, spiralling US imports into a new landscape of paperwork and processes, subject to duties and tariffs based on their place of origin.

Just a month after de minimis ended, while shipping products with UPS, Tezumi Tea, an online Japanese tea and teaware company that sells its products online and through meetups in New York City, fell victim to the tariff backlog at US customs. Tezumi lost roughly 150kg (330lbs) of matcha, totalling about $13,000.

“We responded by increasing buffers in our supply planning across the dozen farms that we partner with,” said Ryan Snowden, a cofounder of Tezumi. “Even with those adjustments, the loss had a severe effect on a number of our cafe customers who suddenly needed to switch to another matcha blend.”

Now, UPS is no longer accepting shipments from Japan, and Tezumi has switched to shipping supplies through alternate carriers such as DHL and FedEx.

Disposing shipments

Wasserbach has witnessed similar instances of UPS losing imports.

“When a UPS package goes uncleared, it’s just basically sitting in a UPS facility, uncleared for a certain period of time,” said Wasserbach. “Then UPS indicates in their tracking that they’re disposing of the shipments without making, really, any effort, from what I’ve seen, to contact either the sender or the receiver, to get information they need to do to get the clearance.”

Wasserbach shared email chains with Al Jazeera from UPS customers who looped in his firm to their customs clearance UPS debacles.

In one exchange, UPS customer Stephan Niznik responded to a notice from the UPS Alternate Broker Team that their packages had been “destroyed”.

“The tracking says on multiple instances that UPS attempted to contact the sender (me), but this is false; aside from a request for more information on September 5 (which I responded to immediately), UPS never attempted to contact me,” wrote Niznik. “It is absolutely disgraceful that my package was mishandled – clothes and children’s toys were destroyed at the hands of UPS.”

In another email chain, UPS told customer Chenying Li that their package was released following an email from Express Customs Clearance stating that the shipment was cleared.

A week later, Li’s package was still showing as “Pending Release”, and when they asked for an update on the shipment, UPS responded, “At this time we are unable to provide an ETA,  as volume is currently backed up and awaiting delivery due to the De Minimis impact.”

‘Impose additional pressure’

In addition to the customs backlog, Virginia Tech associate professor David Bieri says cost prevention may provide one explanation for UPS choosing to dispose of packages rejected by US customs rather than return the shipments to senders.

“All these additional rules and regulations impose additional pressure on already relatively tight margins for these companies – UPS, FedEx, DHL and so forth,” said Bieri. “They need to make money, and sometimes it’s easier not to fulfil a service than to take on the additional cost of customs clearance and making sure that it gets to its final destination.”

Bieri added that UPS resorting to package disposal may indicate that they believe themselves to be in “a sufficiently strong monopolistic position that they can do such horrible practice – unilateral nonfulfillment of contract”.

Wasserbach told Al Jazeera that “with FedEx and DHL shipments, we aren’t seeing these problems”.

When asked whether FedEx has disposed of packages stuck in customs, a spokesperson wrote, “If paperwork is not complete and/or rejected by US Customs and Border Protection, FedEx actively works with senders to update paperwork to resubmit to CBP or return shipments to senders. In some cases, shippers can request that packages be disposed of if they would prefer not to pay to return to sender. In those rare cases, recipients are notified at the direction of the shipper. This is not a common practice. We remain business as usual.”

Final cost of delivery at your doorstep

But FedEx and DHL are encountering some of the same challenges as UPS. Since August, when de minimis ended and small packages were suddenly subject to taxes and tariffs, anyone who ordered from abroad was susceptible to unexpected fees on imported goods.

Without de minimis protecting packages worth $800 and less from import fees, the consumer essentially becomes the importer.

“You might order something you find a bargain abroad, and you don’t pay attention to where things are shipped from … and it might be shipped from China, and you might be in for a rude awakening once that thing arrives at your door,” said Beiri. “You paid the price and thought that this was it. But your deliverer is saying, no, actually, we’re passing that cost on to you. Because you’re acting as the importer.”

These fees could cost equal to or more than the item you ordered itself. “You’ve got to pay extra attention to small prints,” said Beiri.

With looming costs and lost packages on the horizon, Beiri says shoppers will likely make “substitution questions” – are you renovating or are you going on vacation? Are you splashing on Christmas gifts, or are you treating yourself to dining out?

“I think these are interesting times of having to make choices and asking yourself what can we do given that we have an affordability crisis, rent, insurance, making ends meet,” said Beiri. “That’s what’s currently going on.”

In order to better handle evolving trade policy, Wasserbach says that UPS will likely aim to hire a massive number of entry writers to assist with necessary documentation for legal transportation of goods across international borders. However, now that it is the busiest time of year in terms of delivering people their Christmas shopping, Wasserbach doubts an influx of hiring could make much of a difference, given the amount of training required.

The company’s revenue has already taken a hit on account of Trump’s policies. Tariffs on China and the elimination of the de minimis rule saw imports from China, UPS’s most profitable route, drop reportedly 35 percent earlier this year.

“I would assume it’s gonna get better next year,” said Wasserbach. “But as for solving this problem before Christmas, I don’t think that that’s gonna happen.”

Srebrenica: Genocide on Trial

The horrors of the Srebrenica genocide in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the war crimes trials that gave birth to the ICC.

Save

The administration of United States President Donald Trump has suspended leases on five large-scale offshore wind projects over what it called national security concerns, sending shares of offshore wind companies plunging.

The suspension on Monday of the Atlantic coast projects, which were already under construction, was the latest blow for offshore wind developers that have faced repeated disruptions under Trump.

Recommended Stories

The US president has said he finds wind turbines ugly, costly and inefficient, while pursuing a larger pivot away from renewable energy.

Shares in Danish energy firm Orsted, which owns two of the affected projects, traded down more than 12 percent by late morning, with other companies like Dominion and Equinor also trading lower.

The US Department of the Interior said the Department of Defense had raised concerns that the movement of huge turbine blades for offshore wind projects, as well as the highly reflective towers that hold them up, could cause radar interference that could make it hard for the military to identify and locate threats.

“The prime duty of the United States government is to protect the American people,” Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said in a statement.

The pause will give relevant federal agencies “time to work with leaseholders and state partners to assess the possibility of mitigating the national security risks posed by these projects,” the department said.

The pause will affect Orsted ‘s Revolution Wind and Sunrise Wind projects, Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners’ Vineyard Wind 1 project, Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind, and Equinor’s Empire Wind 1 project, according to the department.

The National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA), a trade group representing offshore wind developers, urged the administration to end the pause quickly.

“The regulatory process involves a rigorous framework for assessing the national security implications of proposed projects, and every project under construction has already undergone review by the Department of Defense with no objections,” NOIA President Erik Milito said.

Orsted, Equinor and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners were not immediately available for comment.

Dominion said the suspension will threaten grid reliability for its Virginia customers, including military bases and data centres powering artificial intelligence.

“These electrons will power the data centres that will win the AI race, support our war fighters, and build the nuclear warships needed to maintain our maritime supremacy,” the company said in a statement.

Anti-wind stance

Monday’s move was the latest instance of the administration ordering a pause to offshore wind projects already under construction.

In August, the administration ordered Orsted to halt the advanced construction on the Revolution Wind project off the Rhode Island coast, though a federal judge later lifted the ban.

Earlier in the year, the administration lifted a stop-work order on Equinor’s Empire Wind in a compromise with New York state that paved the way for a natural gas pipeline Trump supports.

Trump campaigned for the White House on a promise to end the offshore wind industry, saying “windmills” are too expensive and hurt whales and birds. He has instead promoted oil and gas drilling.

The uncertainty has taken a financial toll on developers. Orsted raised $9.4bn earlier this year to help fund US projects after potential partners were deterred by Trump’s approach.

Displaced Sudanese families in the war-torn Darfur region are grappling with a dangerous measles outbreak that is spreading rapidly, a Doctors Without Borders (MSF) official warns.

Dr Ali Almohammed, an MSF emergency health manager, told Al Jazeera on Monday that the group has been “overwhelmed” by measles cases arriving each day at the Nyala Teaching Hospital in South Darfur, where MSF provides paediatric and maternal healthcare.

Recommended Stories

“We have 25 beds [in] isolation for measles, but every day the number of cases is increasing,” Almohammed said in an interview from Amsterdam.

“The capacity of MSF to respond to all the needs of the people in Darfur is really limited. We cannot cover everything. Yes, we are trying to focus on the most lifesaving medical care, but still, our capacity is also limited,” he said.

The outbreak of measles, a vaccine-preventable virus, comes as violence between the Sudanese military and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in the western region of Darfur and neighbouring areas has surged in recent weeks.

More than 100,000 people have fled their homes in el-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur State, after the RSF seized control of the city in late October after an 18-month siege.

The United Nations recently warned that Darfur has become “the epicentre of human suffering in the world” and UN and other humanitarian agencies have stressed that trapped civilians lack medicines, food and other critical supplies.

More than 1,300 new cases

According to MSF, more than 1,300 new measles cases have been reported in Darfur since September.

An extremely contagious virus, measles causes high fevers, coughing and rashes.

It is particularly dangerous for children under age five because it can cause serious health complications, according to a fact sheet from the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

This week, MSF said that while nearly 179,000 Sudanese children had been vaccinated against the disease over six months last year, they are only a fraction of the 5 million who are at risk.

The organisation said it is not able to operate in most of North Darfur, including el-Fasher, or in East Darfur as a result of the ongoing conflict.

Almohammed also warned that other preventable diseases, such as diphtheria and whooping cough, are now appearing in Darfur with the number of vaccines arriving just a “drop in the ocean” of what’s needed.

According to MSF, shipping vaccines has been difficult due to ongoing violence as well as “significant administrative and bureaucratic hurdles”.

“We urge authorities to immediately eliminate all bureaucratic and administrative barriers to transporting vaccines throughout Darfur,” the organisation said in a statement.

“At the same time, there must be greater urgency from UNICEF to coordinate efforts to increase the transport and delivery of vaccines, syringes and the necessary supplies.”

Attacks on healthcare

Meanwhile, attacks on healthcare facilities in Sudan have worsened the situation for civilians and medical personnel.

On Saturday, the Sudan Doctors Network said the RSF released nine medical workers from detention in Nyala in South Darfur out of a total of 73 health workers who had been detained by the paramilitary group.

The network welcomed the move as a “positive” step but called for the release of all detained medical workers and civilians without exception.

On Friday, the World Health Organization said attacks on healthcare facilities in Sudan have killed 1,858 people and wounded 490 since the conflict began in mid-April 2023.

At least 70 health workers and about 5,000 civilians have been detained in Nyala in recent months, it added.

A day earlier, the Sudan Doctors Network said 234 medical workers have been killed, 507 injured and 59 reported missing since the war began.