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CNN Poll: Most Americans disapprove of Trump’s approach to Ukraine war

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CNN
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Americans are skeptical that President Donald Trump’s approach to the war between Russia and Ukraine will bring peace to the region, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS. Most Americans view Trump’s handling of the conflict negatively, and 50% say his approach to the war is bad for the United States.

US diplomats are currently working to persuade Russia to agree to a temporary ceasefire in the war that has dragged on for more than three years since Russia’s invasion. While the Biden administration strongly backed Ukraine and unambiguously blamed Russia for the conflict, Trump has blamed Ukraine for causing the war and called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a dictator, drawing complaints from European allies and domestic critics.

CNN’s latest poll finds that 59% of Americans think it’s not too likely or not at all likely that Trump’s approach will bring long-term peace between Russia and Ukraine, while 41% say it’s at least somewhat likely. More broadly, nearly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of Trump’s handling of the US relationship with Russia (59%), and 55% disapprove of his handling of the situation in Ukraine.

Half of Americans think that Trump’s approach to the war between Russia and Ukraine is bad for the US, compared to only 29% who think it’s good for the US (20% say it does not make a difference). This mirrors Americans’ broader views of Trump’s foreign policy moves so far in his second term: while 30% say his decisions have helped America’s standing in the world, more than half (54%) say that they’ve hurt America’s standing.

A sizable share of Republicans express doubts about Trump’s approach to foreign policy, including 15% who see his foreign policy decisions as having hurt America’s standing in the world, 18% who say his approach to the war between Russia and Ukraine is bad for the US and 28% who believe his approach is unlikely to result in long-term peace between the two countries. Democrats are more unified around negative views of Trump’s foreign policy choices.

A broad majority of Americans view Ukraine as either an ally or friendly to the US (72%) and Russia as either unfriendly or an enemy to the US (81%). The share that considers Ukraine to be an ally has climbed 7 points since 2014, just after Russia’s annexation of Crimea. Negative views of Russia have also changed since then, with the share describing Russia as an enemy climbing from 25% in May 2014 to 41% by 2018 and 44% now.

Americans are closely split on whether the US is doing too much (32%), too little (38%) or the right amount (30%) for Ukraine in its war with Russia. In January 2024, 30% of Americans said the US was doing too little for Ukraine.

The public’s view of Trump’s handling of the war breaks sharply along partisan lines, with 84% of Republicans approving of how Trump is handling the situation in Ukraine compared with just 10% of Democrats. Nearly two-thirds of Democrats say the US is doing too little to help Ukraine in its war with Russia, while roughly half of Republicans say the US is doing too much.

Democrats and Republicans also differ in how they view the two countries. Democrats are more likely than Republicans to view Ukraine as at least friendly (82% of Democrats say so, compared with 64% of Republicans) and to view Russia as an enemy (54%, compared with 36% for Republicans).

Haley Romero, 6, stands beneath a massive Ukrainian flag held by demonstrators as they rally in support of Ukraine during a protest on the Ellipse near the White House in Washington, DC, on March 8.

In the aftermath of a highly publicized confrontation in the Oval Office between Zelensky, Trump and Vice President JD Vance, Americans are more likely to view Zelensky positively than negatively (39% to 33%, with 28% expressing no opinion). Roughly two-thirds of Democrats view Zelensky positively, and 63% of Republicans view him negatively. The poll finds both Trump and Vance with net negative favorability ratings overall (42% favorable to 52% unfavorable for Trump, 33% to 44% for Vance).

The poll also finds a majority of Americans with negative views towards Trump’s broader approach to international relations. Nearly 6 in 10 Americans say they disapprove of his handling of foreign affairs, while 54% say that Trump is not an effective world leader and 56% say that Trump’s cuts to federal programs will hurt the nation’s standing in the world (compared to 28% who say the cuts will help, and 15% saying they will neither help nor hurt).

This assessment of Trump’s handling of foreign affairs comes amid a chaotic start to his second term: since the election in November, Trump has threatened to seize territories from allies, frozen foreign aid programs (resulting in intensifying humanitarian crises), announced a wide range of tariffs (including some targeting the United States’ largest trading partners, Canada and Mexico), cut off military aid and intelligence sharing to Ukraine in the aftermath of the Oval Office meeting with Zelensky, and suggested a plan to displace all Palestinians from Gaza.

Americans are split on whether the US should take a leading role in solving international problems (51% say it should and 49% say it should not). This cuts across party lines, with 58% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, and 50% of Republicans and Republican-leaners saying that the US should take a leading role. This is a reversal from the past: in 2015, only 37% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said they wanted the country to take a leading role and a slim majority, 54%, of Republican-aligned adults said the same.

The poll also finds Americans’ views toward other nations shifting, as fewer see a deep connection to the US’s traditional European allies, and unfriendly sentiments about Canada and Mexico are on the rise.

American sentiment towards traditional European allies tested in the poll has dropped uniformly since August 2018. Just 58% now describe Great Britain as an ally, down from 66% in 2018. That figure has dropped from 49% to 39% for Germany, and from 56% to 45% for France. Americans are also more likely to view Mexico and Canada negatively compared to the past – only about half of Americans call Canada an ally now (that has been as high as 65% in a 2000 CNN poll) and only 25% feel that way toward Mexico (40% felt that way in 2000).

Americans’ views of Israel have also shifted somewhat more negative. While 73% call Israel an ally or friendly, similar to the 75% who felt that way in 2018, the 27% who describe it as unfriendly or an enemy is the highest share to say so in CNN polling back to 2000.

Across the countries tested in the poll, respondents are most likely to rate Iran as unfriendly to or an enemy of the United States (88%), followed by North Korea (85%), Russia (81%), and China (74%). Respondents split on their views of Saudi Arabia, with 50% describing it as an ally or friendly and 49% saying it is unfriendly or an enemy.

The poll also finds continued deterioration in American’s views of China. In 2011, 62% of Americans viewed China as an ally or friendly to the US, which declined to 45% in 2018 and 25% in CNN’s most recent poll.

Americans’ generally warm views of Ukraine and Israel don’t always translate to a desire for the US to support their war efforts. A quarter of those who view Ukraine as at least friendly say that the US is doing too much to help the nation in its war with Russia, and 29% of Americans who view Israel as at least friendly say that the US is providing too much assistance to the nation in its war with Hamas.

Overall, 34% say that the US is doing too much for Israel in its war against Hamas, with 47% saying the US is doing the right amount and 19% too little. In January 2024, 29% said the US was doing too little for Israel.

The CNN poll was conducted by SSRS from March 6-9 among a random national sample of 1,206 US adults drawn from a probability-based panel. Surveys were either conducted online or by telephone with a live interviewer. Results among all adults have a margin of sampling error of ±3.3 percentage points.

CNN’s Ariel Edwards-Levy and Jennifer Agiesta contributed to this report.



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Belarus frees key opposition figure Sergey Tikhanovsky following rare visit from top US envoy

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AP
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Belarus has freed Sergey Tikhanovsky, a key dissident figure and the husband of exiled opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, following a rare visit by a senior US official, Tikhanovskaya’s team announced on Saturday.

Tikhanovsky, a popular blogger and activist who was jailed in 2020, arrived in Vilnius, Lithuania, alongside 13 other political prisoners, his wife’s team said. The release came just hours after Belarusian authorities announced that authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko met with US President Donald Trump’s envoy for Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, in Minsk.

A video published on his wife’s official Telegram account showed Tikhanovsky disembarking a white minibus, with a shaved head and broad smile. He pulled Tikhanovskaya into a long embrace as their supporters applauded.

“My husband is free. It’s difficult to describe the joy in my heart,” Tikhanovskaya told reporters. But she added her team’s work is “not finished” while over 1,100 political prisoners remain behind bars in Belarus.

Tikhanovsky was jailed after announcing plans to challenge Lukashenko in the 2020 election. Following his arrest, his wife ran in his stead, rallying large crowds across the country. Official results of the election handed Lukashenko his sixth term in office but were denounced by the opposition and the West as a sham.

As unprecedented protests broke out in the aftermath of the vote, Tikhanovskaya left the country under pressure from the authorities. Her husband was later sentenced to 19 1/2 years in prison on charges of organizing mass riots.

Other prominent dissidents remain in Belarusian jails, among them Nobel Peace Prize winner Ales Bialiatski, a human rights advocate serving a 10-year prison sentence on charges widely denounced as politically motivated. Also behind bars is Viktor Babaryka, a former banker who was widely seen in 2020 as Lukashenko’s main electoral rival, and Maria Kolesnikova, a charismatic leader of that year’s mass protests.

Released alongside Tikhanovsky was longtime Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty correspondent Ihar Karnei, the US government-funded broadcaster confirmed. Karnei, who had also worked with prominent Belarusian and Russian newspapers, had been serving a three-year service on extremism charges he rejected as a sham.

RFE/RL’s Belarusian service had been designated extremist in the country, a common label handed to anyone who criticizes Lukashenko’s government. As a result, working for it or spreading its content has become a criminal offense.

“We are deeply grateful to President Trump for securing the release of this brave journalist, who suffered at the hands of the Belarusian authorities,” the broadcaster’s CEO Stephen Capus said Saturday in a press release.

Karnei was detained several times while covering the 2020 protests. Unlike many of his colleagues, he chose to stay in Belarus despite the ensuing repression. He was arrested again in July 2023, as police raided his apartment seizing phones and computers.

Belarus also freed an Estonian national who had set up an NGO to raise funds for Belarusian refugees. According to the Estonian Foreign Ministry, Allan Roio was detained last January, and sentenced to 6 1/2 years in prison on charges of establishing an extremist organization.



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London has leaned into Jack the Ripper tourism. The locals don’t like it

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London
CNN
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By 8 p.m., three London tour groups are jostling for room in Mitre Square, where murder victim Catherine Eddowes was found with her face mutilated and kidney removed. “I once saw two guides get into a fistfight over space here,” claims Charlotte Everitt, a guide with London-based Rebel Tours.

Tourists often arrive in London with a checklist: Buckingham Palace, Tower Bridge, afternoon tea — and a Jack the Ripper tour. Every night, hundreds of tourists retrace the supposed steps of Jack the Ripper — an unidentified serial killer who brutally murdered at least five women in 1888, yet went on to become one of Britain’s most lucrative cultural exports.

But for some locals, the industry has gone too far. The opening of the Jack the Ripper Museum in 2015 prompted protests. In 2020, Britain’s official mapping body, the Ordnance Survey, axed its tour of London entitled Guts and Garters in the Ripper’s East End following a client request citing “editorial standards.” A mural of the serial killer was painted over with the name Catherine Eddowes — one of his victims — in the same year.

Tourism centered around murder isn’t unique to this corner of London. A recent Netflix show about the Menendez brothers — who were convicted of their parents’ 1989 murders — brought crowds to the family’s Beverly Hills mansion. The site of the Jonestown massacre in Guyana has recently opened to tour groups. In Milwaukee, a “Cream City Cannibal Tour” takes visitors to sites associated with serial killer — and fellow Netflix documentary subject — Jeffrey Dahmer.

“Our dead can give us warnings from history, as it were, but it’s how we remember them, and that’s where the difficulty lies — it’s quite often a politics of remembrance of who we remember and why,” Philip Stone from the Dark Tourism Institute at the UK’s University of Central Lancashire told CNN. “And quite clearly, Jack the Ripper has been remembered because of his atrocities and his infamy, but he’s also been very much romanticized.”

According to Stone, there’s a “push and pull factor” when it comes to the popularity of Jack the Ripper. “The modern Ripper industry certainly markets itself really, really well. But I think there’s an inherent fascination with the story.”

“Time is the greatest healer. But it’s also time that can reinvent the story. There’s a theory of ‘chronological distance,’ the idea of chronologically becoming more and more distant, and being kind of subsumed into popular culture.”

“Jack the Ripper has kind of morphed into this fictional character. He’s been romanticized, it’s been morphed into public culture, and that kind of extends the boundaries or blurs the boundaries between what’s real and what’s not real.”

The tours are undoubtedly popular, and references to the infamous killings around London’s Whitechapel district have become fixtures of the local landscape. A barbershop trades under the name Jack the Clipper. A nearby takeaway shop is called Jack the Chipper. Designer fashion retailer AllSaints has named its flagship store in the area Jack’s Place. Until recently, there was a baked potato vendor called Jacket the Ripper.

Numerous local businesses in East London, including this fish and chip shop, trade on Jack the Ripper's notoriety.

“The issue isn’t discussing the Whitechapel murders,” Everitt said. “The issue is how they’re discussed.” Rebel Tours launched an alternative walking tour in 2022 — Jack the Ripper: What About the Women? Initially, the team considered leaving the murderer’s name out of the title entirely but found that doing so made it significantly harder to attract interest.

“People hear about what we’re doing and say, ‘Oh, that’s amazing,’” Everitt said. “But we’re not seeing the numbers. And I’m not saying we want those numbers — we’re a small-group company, and we like that. But it’s telling how many people still choose the other kind of guide.”

For her, the use of graphic imagery, as well as the insistence that all victims were sex workers despite concrete evidence to the contrary, are among the most troubling aspects.

“Some guides show photos of Mary Jane Kelly’s body,” she said. “If you wouldn’t show the body of a modern-day victim, why is it okay to show hers? She was just as real.”

Local writer The Gentle Author has written more than 5,000 blog posts about the history of the East End on their blog Spitalfields Life — but none on the Whitechapel murders. “The people who live here are really incensed by the tours. On any given evening, you can have hundreds of people marching through these streets. It’s off-the-scale offensive.”

They recall neighbors who moved away shortly after having a child. “They said they couldn’t raise a baby in a home where, every night, a man would stand outside the window and say, ‘This is where someone was cut from lip to navel.’ It’s grim.”

“They project real images of the crime scenes onto walls. There are jokes in these tours about real women being killed. You walk past and people are laughing.”

Guides take eager tourists to places such as Pinchin Street, where one victim's body was discovered.

Four years ago, The Gentle Author began offering their own tours — focused on the East End’s working-class history, immigrant communities, and recent gentrification. Their aim, they say, is to “reclaim the streets for the community.” Still, reaching a broader audience remains difficult. “Most of our customers are readers of the blog. The Ripper tours have monopolized the market.”

“I’ve seen a guide chase guests around a church with a giant butcher’s knife. Another one played the “Psycho” theme at every murder location,” Jessica O’Neil, founder of The Museum Guide and former Jack the Ripper tour guide, told CNN. As a guide, she was against showing crime scene images. “People say it’s educational. If you’re studying forensics in a university setting, maybe. But this isn’t education. It’s presented as entertainment.”

She quit doing Ripper tours five years ago after being publicly confronted. “A sex worker came up to me in the middle of a tour, screaming, ‘Why don’t you care about me and my friends? What’s wrong with you?’” she recalled. “I went back later to try and find her. I don’t know why — maybe to be absolved. I wanted to tell her I was different. But I wasn’t.

“They’re not all awful, some of them do try to talk about the women. I tried to bring compassion. But it’s a ghoulish endeavor,” she said. “And I like ghoulish things. But on those tours, in almost every case, the women are the butt of the joke.”

In 2015, the Jack the Ripper Museum opened, adding to the area’s commercial references to the case — and igniting controversy. The museum had been granted planning permission on the basis that it would showcase the history of women in the East End, with the application describing a space that would honor “the historic, current and future contribution of the women of the East End.”

“Everyone was quite excited that a museum telling the history of the women of London’s East End would be opened. And then we discovered it would actually be a Jack the Ripper museum with some thinly veiled attempts at telling the story of the East End. That’s when there was a backlash,” Catherine Owen, Chair of the East End Women’s Museum — which was founded to counter the Jack the Ripper Museum — told CNN.

The Jack the Ripper Museum told media in 2015 that it's 'not glorifying the murders' yet many remain angry at its theme.

The museum’s founder, Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe, told local media in 2015 that the museum’s full title is Jack the Ripper and the History of Women in East London, that the sign was incomplete, and that: “We are not glorifying the murders or celebrating the murders; we are doing a forensic examination of the murders and setting that in the historical context of the period.”

A decade later, the museum continues to operate under the name Jack the Ripper Museum; the gift shop’s merchandise includes teddy bears dressed as the Ripper and T-shirts with the killer’s silhouette. The Jack the Ripper Museum did not respond to CNN’s request for an interview but highlighted its positive reviews on TripAdvisor.



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World’s best restaurant for 2025 revealed

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CNN
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It looks like Lima is going to be welcoming a lot of fine-dining fans in the coming months.

Two restaurants in the Peruvian capital landed in the top 10 on the 2025 list of the “World’s 50 Best Restaurants,” including the coveted number one spot.

The awards — considered the Oscars of innovative fine dining — were handed out at a ceremony in Turin, Italy on Thursday night, with Lima’s Maido walking away with the top prize.

Ranked number five on last year’s list, it’s owned and run by chef Mitsuharu “Micha” Tsumura.

Maido serves what’s known as Nikkei cuisine, “blending meticulous Japanese techniques with vibrant Peruvian ingredients to create a dining experience that is both culturally rich and innovatively modern” according to the 50 Best organization.

“This is going to be 16 years of Maido,” said Tsumura while accepting the award.

“I think gastronomy — food and hospitality — can do amazing things. They can make dreams come true.”

Coming in second was Asador Etxebarri in Atxondo, Spain, while Mexico City’s Quintonil snagged third place, followed by Diverxo in Madrid (No.4) and Copenhagen’s Alchemist rounding out the top five.

Bangkok restaurant Gaggan earned the number six spot this year.

Moving to Asia, Bangkok emerged as the big winner of the night, with six restaurants making the top 50 list, including Gaggan at number six.

At number seven was Tokyo’s Sézanne, followed by Table by Bruno Verjus in Paris at number eight. Ninth place went to Kjolle in Lima, with fellow South American restaurant Don Julio in Buenos Aires holding onto the tenth spot — exactly where it landed last year.

The only US restaurant to make the top 50 list was New York’s Atomix, at number 12, which also walked away with the award for “Outstanding Hospitality” at the recent James Beard Awards.

Meanwhile, the Thai capital also saw the highest new entry in the top 50 — Bangkok restaurant Potong snagged the 13th spot this year in its inaugural appearance on the list.

Opened in 2021 in the city’s Chinatown area by chef Pichaya “Pam” Soontornyanakij, it’s set in a five-story historic building that, from 1910, housed the family’s Chinese herbal medicine business. Potong’s innovative tasting menu, featuring Thai-Chinese cuisine, has earned it fast fans and a Michelin star.

London restaurant Ikoyi secured the highest climber award by moving up 27 spots from the 2024 list to land at number 15 this year. Serving what 50 Best refers to as “category free cuisine” it scooped the the One To Watch prize in 2021.

Ikoyi has since moved to London’s The Strand, where diners can enjoy its signature dish —smoked jollof rice — from a menu inspired by sub-Saharan West Africa.

The annual list is compiled based on the votes of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants Academy, which is made up of more than 1,100 international restaurant industry experts including food writers and chefs, in 28 regions around the world.

Restaurants can only win the top prize once, after which they’re entered into a separate “Best of the Best” program.

Members of that elite group include Geranium and Noma in Copenhagen, as well as New York’s Eleven Madison Park, The Fat Duck near London, Osteria Francescana in Modena, Italy, Mirazur in Menton, France and Central of Lima. Last year’s “50 Best Restaurants” winner, Barcelona’s Disfrutar, is also now on that list.

1. Maido (Lima, Peru)

2. Asador Etxebarri (Atxondo, Spain)

3. Quintonil (Mexico City, Mexico)

4. Diverxo (Madrid, Spain)

5. Alchemist (Copenhagen, Denmark)

6. Gaggan (Bangkok, Thailand)

7. Sézanne (Tokyo, Japan)

8. Table by Bruno Verjus (Paris, France)

9. Kjolle (Lima, Peru)

10. Don Julio (Buenos Aires, Argentina)

11. Wing (Hong Kong)

12. Atomix (New York City)

13. Potong (Bangkok)

14. Plénitude (Paris, France)

15. Ikoyi (London, England)

16. Lido 84 (Gardone Riviera, Italy)

17. Sorn (Bangkok, Thailand)

18. Reale (Castel di Sangro, Italy)

19. The Chairman (Hong Kong)

20. Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler (Brunico, Italy)

21. Narisawa (Tokyo, Japan)

22. Suhring (Bangkok, Thailand)

23. Boragó (Santiago, Chile)

24. Elkano (Getaria, Spain)

25. Odette (Singapore)

26. Mérito (Lima, Peru)

27. Trèsind Studio (Dubai, UAE)

28. Lasai (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)

29. Mingles (Seoul, South Korea)

30. Le Du (Bangkok, Thailand)

31. Le Calandre (Rubano, Italy)

32. Piazza Duomo (Alba, Italy)

33. Steirereck (Vienna, Austria)

34. Enigma (Barcelona, Spain)

35. Nusara (Bangkok, Thailand)

36. Florilège (Tokyo, Japan)

37. Orfali Bros (Dubai, UAE)

38. Frantzén (Stockholm, Sweden)

39. Mayta (Lima, Peru)

40. Septime (Paris, France)

41. Kadeau (Copenhagen, Denmark)

42. Belcanto (Lisbon, Portugal)

43. Uliassi (Senigallia, Italy)

44. La Cime (Osaka, Japan)

45. Arpege (Paris, France)

46. Rosetta (Mexico City, Mexico)

47. Vyn (Skillinge, Sweden)

48. Celele (Cartagena, Colombia)

49. Kol (London, England)

50. Restaurant Jan (Munich, Germany)



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