• Modi congratulates former Nepal CJ Karki on assuming PM’s office. 
• Karki appointed as first ever interim prime minister in Nepal. 
• Nepal grapples with political and economic instability since 2008.

Nepal’s President Ramchandra Paudel dissolved parliament and called for fresh elections on March 5, his office said late on Friday, following a week of deadly violence that culminated in the appointment of the country’s first woman prime minister in the interim.

The announcement came just hours after Paudel appointed former Chief Justice Sushila Karki to lead the country, following the deadly “Gen Z”-led anti-graft protests that forced Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli to resign.

The president “dissolved the House of Representatives … and fixed March 5, 2026, Thursday for the elections”, according to a statement from the president’s office.

Karki was appointed after two days of intense negotiations between Paudel, army chief Ashok Raj Sigdel and the protest leaders behind Nepal’s worst upheaval in years, which left at least 51 people killed and more than 1,300 injured.

Nepal’s southern neighbour, India, said it hoped that the developments would help foster peace and stability.

“Heartfelt congratulations to the Honorable Sushila Karki Ji on assuming the office of Prime Minister of Nepal’s interim government. India is fully committed to the peace, progress, and prosperity of Nepal’s brothers and sisters,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a post on X.

The country-wide protests were sparked by a social media ban that has since been rolled back. The violence subsided only after Oli resigned on Tuesday.

Nepal has grappled with political and economic instability since the abolition of its monarchy in 2008, while a lack of jobs drives millions of young people to seek work in other countries like the Middle East, South Korea and Malaysia.

The country of 30 million people, tucked between China and India, inched back towards normalcy on Friday — with shops reopened, cars back on roads, and police replacing the guns they wielded earlier in the week with batons.

• Nato announces launch of operation “Eastern Sentry”. 
• US joins allies in statement of concern about incursion.
• Poland hopes US will take action to show solidarity. 

Nato announced plans to beef up the defence of Europe’s eastern flank on Friday, two days after Poland shot down drones that had violated its airspace in the first known action of its kind by a member of the Western alliance during Russia’s war in Ukraine.

At the United Nations, the United States called the airspace violations “alarming” and vowed to “defend every inch of Nato territory,” remarks that appeared aimed at assuaging Washington’s Nato allies after President Donald Trump said Russia’s drone incursion could have been a mistake.

Warsaw has portrayed the drone incursions as an attempt by Russia to test the capabilities of Poland and Nato to respond.

On Friday, Poland rejected Trump’s suggestion that the incursions could have been a mistake, a rare contradiction of the US president from one of Washington’s closest European allies. Its foreign minister told Reuters Poland hoped Washington will take action to show solidarity with Warsaw.

Later on Friday, the US joined Western allies in a statement to express concern about the drone incursion and to accuse Moscow of violating international law and the founding UN Charter.

Russia said its forces had been attacking Ukraine at the time of the drone incursions and that it had not intended to hit targets in Poland. Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said the maximum range of the drones used did not exceed 700 km “which makes it physically impossible for them to have reached Polish territory.”

Nato Secretary General Mark Rutte called the incursions “reckless and unacceptable.”

“We can’t have Russian drones entering allied airspace,” he told a press conference announcing operation “Eastern Sentry.”

Number of allies to join mission

Nato’s top military official, Supreme Allied Commander Europe Alexus Grynkewich, a US Air Force general, said it was a flexible operation to bolster defences along Nato’s entire eastern flank, which stretches from the Baltic states in the north to Romania and Bulgaria in the south.

Grynkewich said “Poland and citizens from across the alliance should be assured by our rapid response earlier this week and our significant announcement here today.”

The mission, which begins on Friday evening, will involve a range of assets integrating air and ground bases. Nato already has substantial forces in eastern Europe, including thousands of troops. It did not specify how many additional troops would be involved in the new operation.

Rutte said allies, including Denmark, France, Britain, and Germany, have committed to the mission with others set to join. He said Nato was still assessing the possible intent behind the Russian incursion.

Nato’s announcement detailed a modest number of additional military assets — including two F-16 fighter jets and a frigate from Denmark, three Rafale fighter jets from France, and four Eurofighter jets from Germany. Spain said it would provide air assets and Britain said it would detail its contribution soon.

Trump told Fox News on Friday that his patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin was “sort of running out and running out fast,” but stopped short of threatening new sanctions over the war.

Trump has repeatedly set deadlines for Moscow to agree to a ceasefire or face new sanctions, only to row back.

Germany said it had extended air policing over Poland and it and France summoned the Russian ambassadors to their countries over the drone incident.

Questions about European defences

For Polish leaders to directly contradict Trump is almost unheard of and a sign of Europe’s alarm at the US president’s willingness to give weight to Moscow’s account.

This week’s incident has raised questions about Nato’s ability to respond to the sort of mass drone attacks — often involving hundreds of unmanned aerial vehicles — that have been a feature of the war in Ukraine following Russia’s 2022 invasion.

A subsidiary of Russian nuclear corporation Rosatom said on Friday that a Ukrainian drone attacked one of the buildings of the Smolensk nuclear power station, but it was downed and no damage or casualties were reported.

European leaders say the incident in Poland again shows Moscow has no interest in a peace deal in Ukraine, weeks after Trump hosted Putin in Alaska and dropped a demand that Russia accept an immediate ceasefire.

European officials have been in Washington this week, hoping to coordinate sanctions on Russia. Announcing such sanctions in tandem was previously standard practice, but has not taken place since Trump returned to office.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday peace negotiations were on pause and that “the Europeans are hindering this” peace process.

Ukrainian officials said US special envoy Keith Kellogg and national security advisers from Britain, Germany, France and Italy were in Kyiv. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said many details on security guarantees for Ukraine were already on paper, and that foreign troops on the ground would signal political support for Kyiv.

Russia and its close ally Belarus began a long-planned joint military exercise on Friday involving drills in both countries and in the Baltic and Barents seas.

Dismissing concerns abroad about the exercise, Peskov said Western European countries were suffering “emotional overload” and that Russia did not pose a threat to them.

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) voted on Friday to back the “New York Declaration,” a resolution which seeks to breathe new life into the two-state solution between Israel and Palestine — without the involvement of Hamas.

The text was adopted by 142 votes in favour, 10 against — including Israel and key ally the United States — and 12 abstentions. It rebukes Hamas and demands that it surrender its weapons.

Although Israel has criticised UN bodies for nearly two years over their failure to rebuke Hamas’s attack on October 7, 2023, the declaration, presented by France and Saudi Arabia, leaves no ambiguity.

Formally called the New York Declaration on the Peaceful Settlement of the Question of Palestine and the Implementation of the Two-State Solution, the text states that “Hamas must free all hostages” and that the UN General Assembly (UNGA) condemns “the attacks committed by Hamas against civilians on October 7”.

It also calls for “collective action to end the war in Gaza, to achieve a just, peaceful and lasting settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict based on the effective implementation of the two-state solution”.

The declaration, which was already endorsed by the Arab League and co-signed in July by 17 UN member states, including several Arab countries, also goes further than rebuking Hamas, seeking to fully excise it from a role in Gaza.

“In the context of ending the war in Gaza, Hamas must end its rule in Gaza and hand over its weapons to the Palestinian Authority, with international engagement and support, in line with the objective of a sovereign and independent Palestinian State,” the declaration states.

The vote precedes an upcoming UN summit co-chaired by Riyadh and Paris on September 22 in New York, in which French President Emmanuel Macron has promised to formally recognise the Palestinian state.

‘Shield’ against criticism

“The fact that the General Assembly is finally backing a text that condemns Hamas directly is significant” even if “Israelis will say it is far too little, far too late”, Richard Gowan, UN director at the International Crisis Group, told AFP.

“Now at least states supporting the Palestinians can rebuff Israeli accusations that they implicitly condone Hamas,” he said, adding that it “offers a shield against Israeli criticism”.

In addition to Macron, several other leaders have announced their intent to formally recognise the Palestinian state during the UN summit.

The gestures are seen as a means of increasing pressure on Israel to end the fighting in Gaza.

The New York Declaration includes discussion of a “deployment of a temporary international stabilisation mission” to the battered region under the mandate of the UN Security Council, aiming to support the Palestinian civilian population and facilitate security responsibilities to the Palestinian Authority.

Around three-quarters of the 193 UN member states recognise the Palestinian state proclaimed in 1988 by the exiled Palestinian leadership.

However, after two years of fighting have ravaged the Gaza Strip, in addition to expanded Israeli settlements in the West Bank and the stated desire by Israeli officials to annex the territory, fears have been growing that the existence of an independent Palestinian state will soon become impossible.

Israel’s devastating retaliatory offensive has killed at least 64,656 Palestinians, most of them civilians. Israel has been facing growing international criticism over the humanitarian crisis in Gaza caused by its offensive with Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and experts already declaring its actions in Gaza as a “genocide”, which Tel Aviv rejects.

“We are going to fulfil our promise that there will be no Palestinian state,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Thursday.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, meanwhile, may be prevented from visiting New York for the UN summit after US authorities said they would deny him a visa.