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Military Bases
The longest US government shutdown on record is doing more than grind activities to a halt at home; an ocean away in Europe, local workers at US military bases have started to feel the pain. Thousands of people working at overseas bases in Europe have had their salaries interrupted since the shutdown began almost six weeks ago. In some cases, governments hosting the US bases have stepped in to foot the bill, expecting the United States to eventually make good. In others, including in Italy and Portugal, people have simply kept working unpaid as the gridlock in Washington drags on. It's an absurd situation because nobody has responses, nobody feels responsible, said Angelo Zaccaria, a union coordinator at the Aviano Air Base in northeastern Italy. This is having dramatic effects on us Italian workers, he told The Associated Press. An array of needed jobs The jobs foreign nationals do at US bases around the world range from food service, construction, logistics, maintenance and othe
Even as it pounds Ukraine, Russia is expanding its military footprint in Africa, delivering sophisticated weaponry to sub-Saharan conflict zones where a Kremlin-controlled armed force is on the rise. Skirting sanctions imposed by Western nations, Moscow is using cargo ships to send tanks, armoured vehicles, artillery and other high-value equipment to West Africa, The Associated Press has found. Relying on satellite imagery and radio signals, AP tracked a convoy of Russian-flagged cargo ships as they made a nearly one-month journey from the Baltic Sea. The ships carried howitzers, radio jamming equipment and other military hardware, according to military officials in Europe who closely monitored them. The deliveries could strengthen Russia's fledgling Africa Corps as Moscow competes with the United States, Europe and China for greater influence across the continent. The two-year-old Africa Corps, which has links to a covert branch of Russia's army, is ascendant at a time when US and
Britain and Mauritius are finalising a deal to transfer sovereignty over the Chagos Islands, a disputed UK territory that is home to a major US military base, the UK government said Tuesday. The government signalled that President Donald Trump's administration, which was consulted on the deal, has given its approval and no further action is needed from the US. We are working with the Mauritian government to finalise and sign the treaty, said Tom Wells, a spokesman for Prime Minister Keir Starmer. Once signed it will be laid before both houses of Parliament for scrutiny and for ratification. Britain and Mauritius have been negotiating a deal for the UK to hand over the Indian Ocean archipelago, which is home to a strategically important naval and bomber base on the largest of the islands, Diego Garcia. The UK would then lease back the base for at least 99 years. But the deal has faced criticism from the opposition Conservative Party and from some allies of Trump. Last year the ...
The US Ambassador to Sri Lanka Julie J Chung has said that Washington has no intention of building a military base in Sri Lanka and hailed it as an "important country" in the strategically vital Indo-Pacific region. Chung's comments came weeks after senior US defence officials arrived here on two special aircraft of the United States Air Force. The visit in February sparked speculation that the US was planning to set up a military base in Sri Lanka. Chung put the speculation to rest in an interview with the Daily Mirror newspaper on Monday. "In terms of the military base, I have said this repeatedly, we have no intention of building a military base (in Sri Lanka)," she said. Chung also said that Washington has "no intention of reviving or reassessing the SOFA Agreement." The Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) was signed in 1995. These are multilateral or bilateral agreements that establish the framework under which the US military personnel operate in a foreign country and how th