BEIRUT (AP) — A Canadian government official condemned what he called Israel’s “unlawful invasion” of Lebanon, saying Beirut should govern its own space and have sovereignty over its lands.
Randeep Sarai, Canada’s secretary of state for international development, visited Lebanon to announce new humanitarian aid to the crisis-hit country, where the U.N. says some 360,000 people remain displaced as a result of the latest conflict between Israel and the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
“We have been working actively, I think, through diplomatic channels to do whatever possible to stop that and to allow Lebanese communities that are from those areas to be able to move back," Sarai said in an interview with The Associated Press late Tuesday.
The latest Israel-Hezbollah war started when Hezbollah fired rockets into northern Israel on March 2, two days after the U.S. and Israel began attacks on Iran. The war has killed over 4,000 people, caused wide destruction in southern Lebanon and at one point displaced over 1 million people.
Israel launched a ground invasion and is now occupying dozens of towns and villages in southern Lebanon, many of which have been almost completely demolished. Israeli officials have said they will not pull out from Lebanon until Hezbollah is disarmed.
Canada has criticized Israel's military actions in Gaza and Lebanon. It lists Hezbollah as a terrorist organization and has condemned its attacks on Israel.
During his visit, Sarai announced that Canada is launching three new programs in Lebanon to support vulnerable families and women, raising the total of its assistance to the nation so far this year to more than 71 million Canadian dollars ($50.23 million).
Canada, which is home to a large Lebanese diaspora, has given Lebanon about 800 million Canadian dollars ($575 million) in assistance over the past 10 years, including nearly $38 million in funding in March to provide basic necessities such as food, medical and health services, Sarai said.
“Our commitment is long-term, and we’re there for Lebanon,” said Sarai, who visited shelters housing people displaced by the war and Syrian refugees during his visit.
Sarai also met President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, who both took their posts last year promising to reinstate state authority over all parts of Lebanon and to implement reforms to fight corruption. The country is still struggling with an economic crisis that began in late 2019 rooted in decades of corruption.
“There’s a lot of optimism and I hope Lebanon will be able to deliver on these,” said Sarai about the pledged reforms. “The world is really watching and supportive of this government, and optimistic that they will achieve those goals."
Sarai said Canada is trying to help create a safe environment in Syria with access to food, drinking water and schools, so that more refugees can return.
“We’ll do whatever we can to make sure that environment is safe when they do decide to go back,” he said.
At one point during Syria's nearly 14-year civil war, Lebanon hosted an estimated 1.5 million refugees.
Some half-million Syrians have returned since former Syrian President Bashar Assad was ousted in December 2024, according to Lebanon’s social affairs minister.
Canada's Secretary of State for International Development Randeep Sarai speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Canada's Secretary of State for International Development Randeep Sarai speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, Aug. 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
BERLIN (AP) — A Ukrainian man wanted in Germany in connection with the 2022 undersea explosions that damaged the Nord Stream gas pipelines was arrested on a European warrant in Croatia on Wednesday, Germany’s federal prosecutor said.
The German prosecutors said that the suspect was a “trained scuba diver” who belonged to a group of people who “planted explosives” on the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea near the Danish island of Bornholm.
The undersea explosions on Sept. 26, 2022, damaged the pipelines, which had been built to carry Russian natural gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea. The damage added to tensions over the war in Ukraine as European countries moved to wean themselves off Russian energy sources after the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor.
The suspect was “strongly suspected of jointly causing explosions, anti-constitutional sabotage, and destruction of buildings and structures," the prosecutors' statement said. It said he was arrested in the Croatian seaside city of Pula and would be brought before an investigating judge at Germany’s federal court of justice after his extradition.
The German prosecutor's office identified the suspect only as Vladimir Z. in its statement announcing his arrest. A spokesperson, however, confirmed to The Associated Press that it was the same man who was arrested in Poland last year but was later released when a Polish court refused to extradite him to Germany. Polish authorities identified him as Volodymyr Zhuravlov.
Poland has long opposed the Nord Stream pipelines, viewing them as an attempt by Russia to use its vast energy resources to gain leverage across Europe. Prime Minister Donald Tusk said at the time of Zhuravlov's extradition hearing that it would not be in Poland’s interest to hand him over.
It was not immediately clear why Zhuravlov left Poland given the arrest warrant that was out for him.
“Volodymyr knew that the ruling applies only on the territory of Poland,” his Polish lawyer, Tymoteusz Paprocki, told the AP, adding that Zhuravlov's wife was also surprised that her husband was detained in Croatia.
The German government welcomed the arrest on Wednesday.
“We’re simply glad that the federal prosecutor’s office is making progress in these investigations, because it’s important that the bombing of the pipelines be clarified as well,” Justice Ministry spokesman Nicholas Limmer told reporters in Berlin.
Last month, German federal prosecutors filed charges against a former Ukrainian army officer in connection with the same explosions.
The suspect, identified only as Serhii K., faces charges of causing an explosion, damaging property, disrupting public service and being an “accomplice to war crimes” by attacking civilian objects.
Serhii K. was detained in August 2025 in an Italian village, where officers raided a bungalow where he was staying with his family. Police said he surrendered without resistance. He was extradited to Germany in November.
The suspects allegedly used a yacht that set off from the German port of Rostock. The yacht had been rented from a German company using forged IDs and intermediaries.
The explosions ruptured the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which was Russia’s main natural gas supply route to Germany until Moscow cut off supplies in August 2022. They also damaged Nord Stream 2, which never entered service because Germany suspended its certification process shortly before Russia’s invasion.
Initially some officials in the West suspected that Russia might have carried out the explosions. But German investigators later pointed to suspected Ukrainian involvement.
Russia has accused the U.S. of staging the explosions, a charge Washington has denied. The pipelines were long a target of criticism by the U.S. and some of its allies, which warned that they increased dependence on Russian gas.
Claudia Ciobanu in Warsaw, Poland, and Fanny Brodersen in Berlin contributed reporting.
FILE - Ukrainian defendant Volodymyr Zhuravlov, right, listens as a judge announces the decision not to allow for extradition to Germany in courtroom of Warsaw's Regional Court in Warsaw, Poland, Friday, Oct. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski, File)
FILE - In this picture provided by Swedish Coast Guard, a leak from Nord Stream 2 is seen, on Sept. 28, 2022. (Swedish Coast Guard via AP, File)
