Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Russian counterpart hold first call since invasion of Ukraine
CBSN
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke to his Russian counterpart, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, Friday for the first time since Russia initiated its invasion of Ukraine.
According to a readout from the Pentagon, during the conversation with Shoigu, Austin "urged an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine and emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication."
The call is the first time the two officials have spoken since Feb. 18, before Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
Lawmakers in Poland have voted in favor of measures to ease the country's near-total ban on abortion, setting the stage for a potential clash over women's rights with the country's conservative president. With their vote on Friday, parliamentarians endorsed several proposals to relax the abortion restrictions, including one from newly elected Prime Minister Donald Tusk's party to decriminalize abortions up to 12 weeks into a pregnancy.
The last opportunity for U.S. nationals to flee violence-wracked Haiti on a government-chartered evacuation flight arrived Friday, with no sign of the chaos easing in the tiny Caribbean nation. The U.S. State Department said last week in an email to Americans in Haiti that charter flights were not scheduled to continue after April 12.
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