The Lebanon ceasefire is 'extended by three weeks'
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Oma varallisuus on elämämme henkilökohtaisimpia asioita. Kun se luottaa toisen hoidettavaksi, pitää sen olla henkilökohtaista myös hänelle. Me OP Privatella ymmärrämme tämän hyvin. Myös jokaisella meistä on oma taloutemme, jota huolellisesti vaalimme. Samalla sitoutumisella suhtaudumme myös sinun varojesi hoitoon. OP Private. Otamme varojesi hoidon henkilökohtaisesti. Tutustu palveluun op.fi kautta private. Varainhoidon tarjoaa Osuspankki tai OP Varainhoito Oy. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.
I'm Alex Ritson, and in the early hours of Friday the 24th of April, these are our main stories. President Trump says the Lebanon ceasefire has been extended for three weeks after diplomatic talks in Washington. Representatives at a United Nations Security Council meeting say measurable yet fragile progress has been made in Haiti's fight against gang violence. The tech giant Meta is cutting a tenth of its global workforce, roughly 8,000 employees, as it boosts spending on artificial intelligence.
Also in this podcast... We are losing money every time there is a blockage of Internet. We are losing, losing, losing, losing, and no one is caring about me.
We hear about life under Russia's Internet crackdown. If President Trump has a chance of turning a ceasefire with Iran into a peace deal, he needs Israel and the armed group Hezbollah, which is backed by the Islamic Republic, to hold their fire in Lebanon. Tehran has made this a condition of any lasting agreement with the United States, and there's been a significant reduction in attacks in Lebanon since a ceasefire there was agreed last week. but it's fragile. On Wednesday, Israeli strikes killed at least five people, one of them a journalist. And on Thursday, Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel. With the ceasefire in Lebanon due to expire on Sunday, a second round of direct talks between the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors in Washington was convened in the White House.
There, Mr Trump announced some good news.
They like each other. I found that out today and I've sort of heard about that. They actually like each other, Lebanon and Israel. And we had a great meeting with the very high officials of Lebanon and very high officials of Israel. And we think that the president of Lebanon and the prime minister of Israel over the next couple of weeks will be coming here. They've agreed to an additional three weeks of I guess no firing, ceasefire. No more firing. Let's see. We hope that happens. It's not going to happen between them, but they do have Hezbollah to think about. We had a great conversation, and I think it's the beginning of something very important. It would be a wonderful thing to get this worked out simultaneously with what we're doing in Iran.
Hezbollah rejected any Lebanese negotiations with Israel as the Israeli army continues to occupy a large part of southern Lebanon. I asked our North America correspondent David Willis if Mr Trump was more eager to get involved in Lebanon for the sake of getting a deal with Iran. He does, Alex, saying that Lebanon is a beautiful country that got torn apart and adding that the United States is keen to get involved, work with Lebanon in order to protect it from Hezbollah. And President Trump said that Lebanon and Israel have, as he put it, a common problem, namely Hezbollah. And following these high-level meetings, he is clearly hopeful, it would seem, that a ceasefire can be sustained, Alex. Lebanon has agreed to the ceasefire, but not Hezbollah, which Israel has been fighting.
So, given that, can this three-week extension actually achieve anything? Well, it's a million-dollar question. President Trump made clear that the United States' close ally, Israel, has the right to protect itself should it come under attack. Israel, of course, has established that self-declared buffer zone in southern Lebanon, and Hezbollah regards them... as occupying forces in that area. Hezbollah has said it wants the ceasefire to continue on the basis of full compliance, as it puts it, by Israel, but there remains considerable mistrust.
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