Sunday, June 4, 2023

Your Monday Briefing: A deadly train crash

Investigations into the cause continue
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By Natasha Frost

Writer, Briefings

Good morning. We're covering investigations into a train crash in India and strikes on Ukraine.

Railway workers in India on Sunday at the site of a three-train crash.Atul Loke for The New York Times

India intensifies investigation into train crash

The authorities in India have intensified the investigation into the causes of a devastating three-way train crash in which 275 people died. While officials were looking into the malfunction of an electronic signaling system, they had not ruled out human error — or even sabotage — and vowed punishment for those responsible, India's railway minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw, said yesterday.

India's railway network is one of the largest in the world, transporting about eight billion passengers a year. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government has frequently publicized its investments in expanding infrastructure, but a recent official audit noted that the amount invested in safety for much of the fleet of more than 13,000 trains was decreasing.

Railway officials grumbled in private that by initiating a high-profile inquiry into the crash, political leaders were looking for scapegoats to distract from a well-documented truth: Despite India's trumpeting that it has reduced the frequency of mass-casualty rail accidents in recent years, the work of assuring safety on the country's trains remains deeply underfunded.

Details: A high-speed passenger train collided with a parked freight train around 7 p.m. on Friday and derailed. Some of its cars slammed into another moving passenger train.

Ukrainian troops targeting Russian positions in eastern Ukraine last week.Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

Strikes in Ukraine ahead of a counteroffensive

Explosions rang out across the front line in Ukraine as both sides sought to gain an advantage before an expected Ukrainian counteroffensive to retake territory captured by Russia. Russian forces fired cruise missiles and attack drones at targets across Ukraine overnight on Saturday, according to Ukrainian officials, while blasts were reported in Russian-occupied Melitopol and Berdiansk in southern Ukraine.

The civilian toll of the war continues to climb. The body of a 2-year-old girl was pulled from the rubble after a Russian strike in the Dnipropetrovsk region that also wounded 22 others, including five children, a regional official said. At least 535 children have died in the war, and at least 1,000 have been wounded, according to official figures.

After months of preparations, Ukrainian officials have said in recent days that Kyiv's forces are ready to launch its counterattack, and in a speech, Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelensky, took the unusual step of thanking a dozen individual soldiers by name for their service to their country.

Victims: Zelensky paid tribute to the children lost to the war. "Many of them could have become famous scholars, artists, sports champions, contributing to Ukraine's history," he said in a statement.

Related: Curriculums in Russian schools are increasingly emphasizing patriotism and the heroism of Moscow's army and demonizing the West.

President Emmanuel Macron of France at a factory in Dunkirk, France.Pool photo by Pascal Rossignol

Warnings over France's finances

Three ratings agencies have expressed concerns about France's ability to rein in its public finances amid high general government debt, adding to fears about whether the country's president, Emmanuel Macron, can move forward with his efforts to lift competitiveness and growth in a tense social and political climate.

France's economy, the eurozone's second largest, is forecast to remain subdued until at least next year, but more worrisome to ratings agencies is the nation's financial situation. France spent vast sums to shield households and businesses from an inflation crisis and painful pandemic lockdowns. Now, the potential for a downgrade is deeply worrying top officials.

France's debt has surged to 111 percent of economic output, casting France into a club with Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain — the major eurozone economies holding the highest debt ratios. In Germany, which has Europe's largest economy and is a stickler for budget discipline, the debt burden is 66 percent of economic output.

Warnings: S&P Global said it could lower France's ratings in the next 18 months if the debt did not decline, a risk that would be amplified if there was a prolonged economic slowdown or if France did not adequately curb government spending.

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That's it for today's briefing. Thanks for joining me. — Natasha

P.S. Fictional cocktails, a puppy's bowel movements, a Thanksgiving dinner play-by-play: We asked readers to show us the contents of their Notes app.

Friday's edition of "The Daily" explores why college-educated Americans are leaving big coastal cities.

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