❗️🇺🇸🇺🇦 Biden authorizes the State Dept to provide $100 million in defense aid to Ukraine - memorandum

➡️Lawmakers in Oklahoma on Tuesday approved a near-total ban on abortion, making it the latest Republican-led state to forge ahead with stringent abortion legislation as the Supreme Court weighs a case that could overturn Roe v. Wade later this year.

The measure, Senate Bill 612, would make performing an abortion “except to save the life of a pregnant woman in a medical emergency” a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a fine of $100,000.

The Oklahoma House voted 70 to 14 to send the bill, which passed the Senate last year, to Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican whose office responded by noting that Mr. Stitt vowed in September to sign “every piece of pro-life legislation” that came to his desk.

If Mr. Stitt signs the bill, it would take effect on Aug. 26, according to the Senate clerk’s office.

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💉A second booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine provides additional short-term protection against Omicron infections and severe illness among older adults, according to a large new study from Israel.

But the booster’s effectiveness against infection in particular wanes after just four weeks and almost disappears after eight weeks. Protection against severe illness did not ebb in the six weeks after the extra dose, but the follow-up period was too short to determine whether a second booster provided better long-term protection against severe disease than a single booster.

The study focused on adults ages 60 and older, and did not provide data on the effectiveness of a second booster in younger populations. But the study covered a relatively short period, and whether the benefits against illness hold up over the longer term remains unknown. The study did not report data on deaths.

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🗳A New York appellate judge on Monday hit the brakes on a sweeping lower-court decision that invalidated newly drawn legislative districts favorable to Democrats and threatened to throw the state’s election season into turmoil.

Justice Stephen K. Lindley of New York’s Fourth Appellate Department in Rochester issued the temporary stay after state Democratic leaders formally contested the lower court’s opinion last week that the maps were unconstitutional and, in some cases, gerrymandered for partisan gain.

He did not address the merits of the case but indicated that he hoped to expedite his own ruling on whether the lines were constitutional.

“The appeal will be greatly accelerated for obvious reasons, and I anticipate that a decision could be rendered within the next three weeks, if not sooner,” Justice Lindley wrote in a note instructing both Democrats and the Republicans challenging the maps to attend a Thursday hearing.

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📲Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, reached out to Parag Agrawal, Twitter’s chief executive, a few weeks ago with a friendly heads-up. He was buying shares of the social media company, Mr. Musk confided, and wanted to discuss how to make Twitter better.

Free speech, open-source algorithms, and an edit button: The world’s richest person will soon help steer the social media platform where he has a huge following.

Mr. Musk had ideas for reshaping social networks that dovetailed with those of Mr. Agrawal and Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s co-founder, according to their public exchanges.

In the ensuing weeks, Mr. Agrawal discussed having Mr. Musk become a more active participant in Twitter’s future, according to two people with knowledge of the conversations who were not authorized to speak publicly.

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❗️ Police say car slams into gate of Russian Embassy in Romanian capital and catches fire; 1 dead

🗣 Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova believes "the West is using the expulsion of Russian diplomats as an information and political attack against Moscow"

⚡️ Russian border guard positions in the Kursk region were fired upon yesterday, the Governor says;

The shooting was repelled by return fire from border guards in the Kursk region, there were no casualties or damage to Russia

Romanian social media users have published footage appearing to show the burning car that slammed into the Russian Embassy gate

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❗️ If the US is serious about helping to resolve the situation in Ukraine, they should stop adding fuel to the fire by imposing sanctions, the Chinese Foreign Ministry says

⚡️ An attempt to ram the gates of the Russian Embassy in Bucharest is the result of anti-Russian hysteria over the Bucha provocation, the Russian diplomatic mission in Romania says

📌 The latest on the Ukraine operation from the Russian Defence Ministry:

▪️ Russian air forces conducted strikes against 24 military targets in Ukraine overnight;

▪️ The Russian military took out five storage facilities for petrol, oil, and lubricants in the south and east of Ukraine;

▪️ Since 24 February, Russian forces have eliminated 125 Ukrainian planes, 93 helicopters, and 407 drones. Some 1,981 tanks and other armoured combat vehicles have also been destroyed

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❗️ Russia is interested in Zelensky agreeing to proposed conditions at the Moscow-Kiev talks, and aims to end its military operation that way, the Kremlin says

Watch a video of Onyx supersonic missiles striking Ukrainian fuel depots

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Russian military doctors have saved the life of an Izium resident (Kharkov region) who covered orphaned children during the shelling of the town by Ukrainian nationalists

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✈️ It looks as though the next-generation Air Force One presidential jets will take a little longer than expected as Boeing has run into production problems.

Company staff found themselves in difficulties after they tried to place one of two planes on jacks, but the weight exceeded the jacks' limit.

This is not the first time production problems at Boeing have caused a jet's delivery to be delayed, although the firm has received as much as $3.9 billion to built aircraft. To top it off, last year two bottles of tequila were found onboard an aircraft

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📌 Kremlin spokesman Peskov's latest statements:

▪️ There are no grounds for a real default in Russia, it can only be artificially created by the West;

▪️ The Bucha provocation should be investigated and it is important to establish what constitutes an impartial independent inquiry

▪️ The work on Russia-Ukraine peace talks is continuing;

▪️ If the West continues to block Russian payments in eurobonds in foreign currency, Moscow will pay in rubles;

▪️ US bio lab programmes aren’t transparent; Americans should present all info available

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⚡️ NATO won't be party to the conflict in Ukraine, German Chancellor says

⚡️ The driver deliberately slammed into the gates of the Russian Embassy and set fire to himself, Romanian police say

⚡️ UN General Assembly to vote on removing Russia from UNHRC on 7 April

⚡️Hungary's PM Orban: "I am convinced we will pay price for sanctions on Russia"