Hard Numbers: Holiday flights canceled, “Putin’s chef” condemned, Israel invests in Golan, El Salvador frees miscarriage “murderers”

Hard Numbers: Holiday flights canceled, “Putin’s chef” condemned, Israel invests in Golan, El Salvador frees miscarriage “murderers”
A screen showing cancelled flights is seen at John F. Kennedy International Airport during the spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant in Queens, New York City, U.S., December 26, 2021.
REUTERS/Jeenah Moon

1,000: More than 1,000 airline flights with a stop in the US were canceled on Sunday due to crews testing positive for COVID. Globally, thousands of holiday season flights have been scrapped due to the omicron wave.

310 million: Israel will invest some $310 million to double the number of Jewish settlers living in the Golan Heights, a swath of strategic territory captured from Syria in 1967. Although Golan is considered occupied land under international law, the US has recognized Israeli sovereignty there since 2019.

15: Fifteen Western governments have condemned the deployment of mercenaries employed by Russia's shadowy Wagner Group in conflict-ridden Mali. The Kremlin has officially denied any links to the private military company, which is owned by Vladimir Putin's former caterer.

3: El Salvador freed three women who’d been jailed for aggravated homicide after suffering miscarriages. Under the country’s draconian abortion laws, losing a pregnancy can count as murder. The women were serving sentences of up to 13 years.

More from GZERO Media

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy addresses lawmakers as he presents the so-called 'Victory Plan' during a parliament session, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine October 16, 2024.
REUTERS/Andrii Nesterenko

On Wednesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky presented his much-discussed “victory plan” to Ukraine’s parliament.

U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, U.S., July 25, 2024.
REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz

From the IDF’s offensive in Rafah to its more recent invasion in Lebanon, there have been myriad examples of Israel taking escalatory steps that Washington has vocally opposed.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa interacts with the leader of the opposition party, John Steenhuisen ahead of National Assembly members' questions in parliament in Cape Town, South Africa, November 3, 2022.
REUTERS/Esa Alexander

This unexpected alliance between South Africa’s long-ruling ANC and the Democratic Alliance has shown early signs of promise.

FILE PHOTO: At a secret jungle camp in Myanmar's eastern Karen state, a fitness coach and other civilians are training with armed ethnic guerrillas to fight back against the country's military takeover.
REUTERS/Independent photographer

After a year of rebel victories that have left Myanmar’s ruling junta on the defensive, its chairman, Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, invited ethnic minority armies to peace talks in a state television broadcast on Tuesday.

In this episode of “Energized: The Future of Energy,” a podcast series from GZERO Media's Blue Circle Studios and Enbridge, host JJ Ramberg and Enbridge CEO Greg Ebel talk to Justin Bourque, President of Athabasca Indigenous Investments, and Mark Podlasly, Chief Sustainability Officer of First Nations Major Project Coalition. They discuss how a partnership deal between Enbridge and 23 Indigenous communities in northern Alberta is improving life for those communities and how Indigenous peoples are investing in the energy transition—and their futures. Listen to this episode at gzeromedia.com/energized, or on Apple, Spotify, Goodpods, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni pays tribute to the 309 victims of the earthquake that struck, in L'Aquila, Italy, on 5 April 2009.
Andrea Mancini/NurPhoto via Reuters

1.25: Surrogacy has been banned in Italy for 20 years, but Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’sconservative government has just gone a step further and criminalized seeking surrogacy abroad.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ruled Tuesday that certifying elections is a required duty of county election boards in Georgia, and they’re not allowed to refuse to finalize results based on suspicions of miscounts or fraud.
TNS/ABACA via Reuters Connect

On Tuesday, a judge in Georgia blocked a new rule requiring that election ballots be hand-counted in the state, a change that allies of former President Donald Trump wanted. Opponents of the rule, which the Georgia State Election Board passed in September, said it would cause unnecessary delays in results and lead to avoidable electoral pandemonium.