🇺🇸🤝🇮🇹 — US Vice President JD Vance says Italian is 'the most beautiful language imaginable', joking with Italy's Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, as he begins his Easter visit in Rome.

"She could've called me a jerk and I wouldn't know!"

🔗 Sky News (@SkyNews)

🇺🇸🇻🇦📹 — US Vice President JD Vance and family attending the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion at St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican

On video, Vice President JD Vance walks into St. Peter’s Basilica, holding his babies, to honor the Lord on Good Friday.

🇺🇸🇻🇦📹 — US Vice President JD Vance, his wife Usha, and three children in the Vatican’s St. Peter’s Basilica today for the Solemn Liturgy of the Fast of Good Friday

🔗 Catholic Sat (@CatholicSat)

🇷🇺🕊🇺🇦 — Russian State Media announces that Russian President Vladimir Putin declared an Easter ceasefire truce

➡️ The Easter truce will begin today at 6 p.m. Moscow time, Putin said.

➡️ He ordered that all military actions be stopped and halted for the duration of the Easter truce.

➡️ The progress of the truce will "show the readiness of the Kyiv regime" to desire and be able to peacefully resolve the issue, Putin said

➡️ Putin instructed Gerasimov to report separately when the territory of the Kursk region is "completely cleared of the enemy"

❗️The ceasefire is being introduced for humanitarian purposes and will be observed by the Russian group of troops, provided that Kyiv mutually observes it, the Russian Defense Ministry reported

https://news.1rj.ru/str/rian_ru/290135

🇩🇪✝️📞🇪🇺 — German Conservative Chancellor in waiting Friedrich Merz wishes the German population a Happy Easter and say that Germany is once again ready to take responsibility for European affairs

"The joyful message of Easter reminds us that change is possible. Germany will once again assume responsibility – in Europe and in the world. Not loudly, but reliably. Not arrogantly, but in partnership. It is now up to us to shape the future." (tm)

🔗 Friedrich Merz (@_FriedrichMerz)

🇷🇺🇺🇦🕊⚠️ — For nobody's surprise, both Ukrainian and Russian sources report that the Easter truce has already been violated.

🇷🇺❌🇺🇦 — The Russians continue to fire in all directions, as before. They are currently conducting an information operation against Ukraine ," said Andriy Kovalenko, head of the Center for Countering Disinformation at the National Security and Defense Council.

"The Russians are trying to pretend that they are "peacekeepers", but they have already refused an unconditional ceasefire on March 11," Kovalenko reminds.

And he adds that ideas for such information operations are usually proposed by the head of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, Sergei Naryshkin.

🔗 GeoInsider (@InsiderGeo)

🇺🇸🇾🇪 New High-Res Satellite Images of Houthi Strikes

"On the western part of the shoreline, the storage tanks have been completely flattened. Further southeast down the beach, we can see that fuel trucks were targeted, and this would explain the high death toll; currently standing at at least 74, with 171 others wounded

The issue however, is that vessels are still unable to leave the bay because they remain under the threat of the Houthis, who (according to our sources) have declared that they would fire upon the vessels should they attempt to depart without discharging their cargo. We can also see that there’s fuel spillage into the bay as a result of the bombings. Oddly enough, a jetty remains intact even though the beach behind it is showing impact craters.

The Houthis are still holding the GALAXY LEADER (9237307) vessel."

🔗 TankerTrackers

🇺🇸🇹🇼 The US Marine Corps is all set to deploy Anti Ship Missiles to Batanes Islands in the Luzon strait, as a part of Balikatan 2025. This marks the first time that these missiles will be deployed near this very strategic chokepoint.

🔗 Orion Intel

🇨🇳 CIC Midwatch Team on X: "if more than one NMESIS battery is deployed to the 🇵🇭, they could be positioned on any of the Babuyan/Batanes islands and still effectively deny access through the Luzon Strait or Bashi Channel.

If the U.S. decides to deploy the same missile system to either the Senkakus or the southern Japanese island chains, I've included those locations hypothetically. I believe Japan has either already deployed its own assets to those islands or is planning to do so."

https://fxtwitter.com/CIC_OS/status/1912995874168603108