🗳 Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party is leading in the country's general election after receiving 62 percent of the votes, the Israeli Central Elections Committee said.

Based on the count made on Wednesday morning, Likud has the largest number of seats in the Israeli parliament - the Knesset - with 33 seats. Incumbent Prime Minister Yair Lapid's Yesh Atid party came second with 25 seats and the Religious Zionist Party ranked third with 14. To secure a parliamentary majority, Netanyahu could form a right-wing religious coalition with his traditional partners, backed by a parliamentary majority of 69 seats

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⚡️ Moscow will present materials and evidence of London's involvement in the attack on Sevastopol to the British ambassador – Russia’s Foreign Ministry

💸 Africa will need average annual investments of $40Bln in electricity grids to ensure that the continent's inhabitants have stable electricity, Kola Adesina, group managing director of the Sahara Power Group, said

“Massive investment in Africa’s grids is essential for improving system reliability, expanding access and facilitating the integration of variable renewables,” Adesina emphasized. “Annual investment in electricity grids in the years between 2026 and 2030 should be should more than triple the investment between 2016 and 2020, bringing the amount to $40Bln a year on average. Distribution networks account for more than two-thirds of this total.”

Africa remains one of the world's most vulnerable places regarding access to electricity.

❗️ According to a UN study published in 2021, 600Mln people don’t have access to electricity, and some 900Mln have no access to clean cooking fuel

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❗️Russian MoD briefing on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️Russian troops repelled an attack by the Ukrainian Army and foreign mercenaries back to their original positions in the Kupyansk direction, eliminating up to 150 Ukrainian servicemen and mercenaries;

▪️The Russian Air Force shot down a Ukrainian MiG-29 in the Kharkov region;

▪️The Russian Army thwarted attempts of Ukrainian troops to attack in the direction of several settlements in the LPR;

▪️Russian troops repelled attempts by the Ukrainian Army to break through in the Nikolaev-Krivoy Rog direction, eliminating over 100 Ukrainian servicemen;

▪️The Ukrainian Army lost more than 250 soldiers during attempts to attack in the Krasny Liman direction;

▪️Russian Forces destroyed a Ukrainian radar station for guidance and target designation of an S-300 air defense system in the Kherson region.

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🇳🇬 🌊 Nigeria opens its first deep sea port in state of Lagos

▪️ In a handing over ceremony, the company which built the facility, China Harbor Engineering Company, gave the port to the government of Nigeria.

▪️ The Lekki Deep Sea Port, a commercial venture undertaken by China, France, and Nigeria, is now the biggest seaport in Nigeria and one of the biggest in West Africa. The facility, which is expected to handle 1.2Mln standard containers yearly, started to be built in June 2020 as part of the Belt and Road initiative

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❗️Key points of phone call between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Indonesian counterpart Joko Widodo:

▪️Both parties discussed the G20 summit in Bali, Putin praised Indonesia's constructive and depoliticized work;

▪️Russia is ready to provide significant amounts of grain as humanitarian aid to the poorest countries;

▪️Putin informed the Indonesian president on the situation following the Kiev regime’s terrorist attack against the Black Sea fleet using the maritime corridor.

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⚡️Nord Stream AG discovered man-made craters on the bottom of the sea 3-5 meters deep, the pipe section between them is completely destroyed. The company also said that it completed initial data collection from damage site on first line of Nord Stream in Swedish waters.

Experts continue to analyze the data obtained during the survey on the destruction of the Nord Stream

🇫🇷 Rumble has rejected the French government’s demand to remove Russian news outlets from the platform and says it will disable access to Rumble for users in France.

💬 In an official post, the company said they had decided to disable access to Rumble for users in France and “challenge the legality of the government’s demands.”

Commenting on the matter, the head of Rumble Chris Pawloswki added that the video-hosting platform will not move its “goal posts” for any foreign government.

▪️Western countries blocked RT and Sputnik shortly after the beginning of the Russian special military operation to demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine under the pretext that Moscow had instrumentalized the country's media to wage information warfare and spread "false news" about the conflict.

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⚡️⚡️Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement on the prevention of nuclear war: Moscow vows to ensure global strategic stability.

💬 "We are strongly convinced that in the current complicated and turbulent situation, caused by irresponsible and impudent actions aimed at undermining our national security, the most immediate task is to avoid any military clash of nuclear powers," Russia's Foreign Ministry added.

Moscow also urged the other members of the nuclear five to "demonstrate in practice" their readiness to work to "solve this top-priority task" of de-escalation and to "give up the dangerous attempts to infringe on one another's vital interests while balancing on the brink of a direct armed conflict and encouraging provocations with weapons of mass destruction."

WATCH: Russian Su-34 fighter-bombers conduct combat missions during the special operation in Ukraine

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❗️Vladimir Putin’s latest statements about the grain deal:

▪️Russia reserves the right to exit the grain deal if Kiev breaks the guarantees;

▪️Even if Russia exits the deal, Moscow will continue to provide grain as humanitarian aid to the poorest countries;

▪️Moscow is ready to supply the designated amount of grain to the poorest countries free of charge within the deal’s framework.

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👉🛰 ENTER THE ORBIT OF TRUTH

🚀 A Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket with a Russian military satellite was successfully launched from the Plesetsk spaceport, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Wednesday. Later in the day, the ministry said that the satellite had been placed into orbit.

💬 "At the estimated time, the spacecraft was launched into the target orbit by the Fregat upper stage and accepted for control by ground means of the space forces of the air force," the ministry said.

A stable telemetry connection has been established and maintained with the spacecraft, the ministry noted, adding that the satellite's onboard systems are functioning normally.

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⚡️ Ethiopian warring parties agree “cessation of hostilities” – African Union

❗️Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amirabdollahian had a phone call on Wednesday to exchange views on current regional issues, focusing on the situation in the Persian Gulf, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

💬 "The harmfulness of the information campaign launched by the Western media was noted, which, in the conditions of a difficult international situation, could turn into a dangerous escalation of tension in this strategically important region of the world," the statement read.

🇮🇷 In a separate statement, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said that Western countries are deliberately fomenting an atmosphere against Iran, saying that Tehran is allegedly preparing to strike Saudi Arabia.

🇺🇸 On Tuesday, US media outlets reported that Saudi Arabia had shared intelligence with the United States about an "imminent attack" by Iran on targets in Saudi Arabia.

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⚡️ US, UK contribute to strengthening of Afghan wing of Daesh terrorist group - Russian MFA

🇮🇳🚀India has conducted successful maiden flight-test of Phase-II Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) interceptor AD-1 that can destroy incoming missiles at a longer distance.

AD-1 is the weapon designed for exo-atmospheric and endo-atmospheric interception of long-range ballistic missiles as well as aircrafts, equipped with a two stage solid motor.

Indian defense minister Rajnath Singh referred to it as a "unique type of interceptor with advanced technologies available from a very few nations in the world."

He expressed confidence that it will further strengthen the country’s BMD capability.