By Ivana Kottasová, CNN

(CNN) — The United States, Russia and Ukraine rarely agree on anything. But as their delegations meet in Abu Dhabi for their first trilateral meeting since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the three parties seem to have come to the same conclusion: Only one issue remains to be resolved.

That issue is territory, namely the eastern Ukrainian region known as the Donbas. And based on their comments coming into the meeting, it is unlikely to be resolved.

“It’s all about the eastern part of our country, it’s all about the land,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said, pointing to Russia’s long-standing – and previously rejected – demand that Kyiv gives up the parts of the Donbas it still controls.

While US President Donald Trump has touted a deal being close, Zelensky reiterated Thursday that Ukraine was not ready to hand over parts of its territory to Russia. And speaking after a meeting with Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff on Thursday, Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov made it clear Russia was also not willing to compromise.

He warned that there wouldn’t be any long-term settlement “without resolving the territorial issue,” repeating the threat that Russia would continue to pursue its goals “on the battlefield” until an agreement is reached.

What is the Donbas region?

Collectively known as the Donbas, the two coal-rich eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk used to be Ukraine’s industrial heartland.

A steel manufacturing powerhouse, the region is well connected to the Sea of Azov by rivers and man-made canals. It is also known for its fertile agricultural ground and rich mineral deposits.

Why does Putin want it?

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made no secret of the fact that he doesn’t believe Ukraine has the right to exist as an independent country – dismissing the sovereignty it gained in 1991 following the break-up of the Soviet Union.

He has claimed that Ukraine and Ukrainians are part of a larger “historical Russia” and has repeatedly – without any evidence – accused Kyiv of conducting “genocide” against Russian speakers in Ukraine.

Historically the Donbas was the most “Russian” part of Ukraine, with a significant Russian-speaking population living there. And it was in the Donbas that Putin’s mission to destabilize and conquer Ukraine started in 2014.

How did the conflict start?

In 2014, Russia illegally annexed the southern Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea, following a covert military operation led by highly trained Russian soldiers who were not wearing any insignia.

At the same time, Russia began backing and supplying pro-Russian separatists in the Donbas, helping them seize control of parts of Luhansk and Donetsk, including their regional capitals, from what was then an ill-prepared and poorly motivated Ukrainian military.

Russia has long maintained that it had no soldiers on the ground there, but United States, NATO and Ukrainian officials all say the Russian government supplied the separatists, provided them with advisory support and intelligence, and embedded its own officers in their ranks.

In one particularly horrific incident, the separatists used a Russian-provided Soviet-era Buk surface-to-air missile to shoot down a civilian flight MH17, killing 298 people. Moscow has repeatedly denied responsibility, but a Dutch court found two Russians and a separatist Ukrainian guilty of m

By Alexandra Skores, CNN

(CNN) — Travelers will need to have a REAL ID to board their next US domestic flight or face a $45 fee from the Transportation Security Administration beginning on February 1.

Last year, TSA started enforcement of its REAL ID requirement. Several months later, it proposed charging a fee to travelers who haven’t obtained a REAL ID.

Now, TSA is rolling out ConfirmID, a process to streamline the identification check and fee payment for those without a REAL ID. Travelers without a REAL ID can input their information online and pay the fee, set at $45, before heading to the airport to streamline a potentially lengthy compliance process.

The REAL ID Act, which was passed by Congress in 2005, enacted the 9/11 Commission’s recommendation that the federal government enhance security standards for identification.

CNN sat down with Steve Lorincz, deputy executive assistant administrator of TSA to discuss what changes travelers might see beginning in February.

Here’s some of what he had to say, along with some additional details about the new policy.

What happens on February 1?

“February 1 is really the next phase of REAL ID compliance enforcement. We rolled out REAL ID in May of 2025. About 94% of the population, or the passengers that transit through a TSA checkpoint today, have a REAL ID compliant driver’s license or an acceptable form of ID, like a passport. So that leaves us about 6%,” Lorincz said.

That 6% has a couple of options now. Of course, those travelers can go to the Department of Motor Vehicles, or wherever their state issues IDs, and obtain a REAL ID. But for those travelers who haven’t done that by February 1, TSA ConfirmID is an online system where they can enter their name and travel start date and pay a $45 fee.

“Once they pay that $45 fee, they will get a receipt. They will bring that receipt to a TSA checkpoint,” Lorincz said, where a TSA agent will use that receipt, plus a government ID, to process the traveler through the security checkpoint.

At the checkpoint, travelers should be prepared to provide their legal name, address and date of birth to complete the ConfirmID verification process.

TSA ConfirmID is designed to streamline identity verification for air travelers who do not have an acceptable form of ID, according to the TSA website. The identification process takes an average of 10-15 minutes, TSA said. However, it could take 30 minutes or more.

How do travelers know that they have a REAL ID?

“When you look at your driver’s license, there’s usually an indicator at the top of the driver’s license, which is a star,” said Lorincz. “Some states, like California, have the golden bear. So look at that, make sure that you might have a compliant REAL ID driver’s license. If you’re not sure, there’s also a lot of information on the sites for both the DMVs and Secretary of State offices as far as that.”

Are passengers without REAL IDs expected to pay $45 every time they go through a checkpoint?

“The $45 fee is good for 10 days from the date of travel,” Lorincz said. “But if you have future dates of travel coming up, I would encourage those individuals to make sure that they spend some time at the DMVs and Secretary of State offices to get their REAL ID-compliant driver’s license.”

In other words, travelers have 10 days from the star

By Jackie Wattles, CNN

(CNN) — When four astronauts begin a historic trip around the moon as soon as February 6, they’ll climb aboard NASA’s 16.5-foot-wide Orion spacecraft with the understanding that it has a known flaw — one that has some experts urging the space agency not to fly the mission with humans on board. But NASA remains confident it has a handle on the problem and the vehicle can bring the crew home safely.

The issue relates to a special coating applied to the bottom part of the spacecraft, called the heat shield. It’s a crucial piece of hardware designed to protect the astronauts from extreme temperatures as they’re descending back to Earth during the final stretch of their moon-bound mission called Artemis II.

This vital part of the Orion spacecraft is nearly identical to the heat shield flown on Artemis I, an uncrewed 2022 test flight. That prior mission’s Orion vehicle returned from space with a heat shield pockmarked by unexpected damage — prompting NASA to investigate the issue.

And while NASA is poised to clear the heat shield for flight, even those who believe the mission is safe acknowledge there is unknown risk involved.

“This is a deviant heat shield,” said Dr. Danny Olivas, a former NASA astronaut who served on a space agency-appointed independent review team that investigated the incident. “There’s no doubt about it: This is not the heat shield that NASA would want to give its astronauts.”

Still, Olivas said he believes after spending years analyzing what went wrong with the heat shield, NASA “has its arms around the problem.”

Upon completing the investigation about a year ago, NASA determined it would fly the Artemis II Orion capsule as is, believing it could ensure the crew’s safety by slightly altering the mission’s flight path.

“I think in my mind, there’s no flight that ever takes off where you don’t have a lingering doubt,” Olivas said. “But NASA really does understand what they have. They know the importance of the heat shield to crew safety, and I do believe that they’ve done the job.”

Lakiesha Hawkins, the acting deputy associate administrator for NASA’s Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, echoed that sentiment in September, saying, “from a risk perspective, we feel very confident.”

And Reid Wiseman, the astronaut set to command the Artemis II mission, has expressed his confidence.

“The investigators discovered the root cause, which was the key” to understanding and solving the heat shield issue, Wiseman told reporters last July. “If we stick to the new reentry path that NASA has planned, then this heat shield will be safe to fly.”

Others aren’t so sure.

“What they’re talking about doing is crazy,” said Dr. Charlie Camarda, a heat shield expert, research scientist and former NASA astronaut.

Camarda — who was also a member of the first space shuttle crew to launch after the 2003 Columbia disaster — is among a group of former NASA employees who do not believe that the space agency should put astronauts on board the upcoming lunar excursion. He said he has spent months trying to get agency leadership to heed his warnings to no avail.

“We could have solved this problem way back when,” Camarda, who worked as a NASA research scientist for two decades before becoming an astronaut, said of the heat shie

Partly cloudy skies remain Friday as the upper low hovers over the area. Temperatures will be extra cooled today, expect 50s and low 60s. It'll be the perfect evening for a walk by the beach or a run outside, bring a jacket. Winds will be light and waves are calm. Overnight lows drop into the 40s and 50s, a few 30s expected inland.

Marine layer clouds are on tap for most beaches Saturday morning. Onshore flow will be abundant and a slow clearing pattern is expected. Highs rise into the 60s and it'll be a bright evening. Winds remain light and marine conditions are good for surfers and fishermen alike.

Clearing skies for Sunday as a weak set of Santa Ana winds crank up through Ventura. Highs rise a few degrees with maximum temperatures into the 60s and low 70s. We continue with a small warming trend into next week as a weak high pressure ridge sets up. Enjoy a couple of week of mild weather, most data shows we stay dry through the first week of February.

The post Cool & dry Friday, tracking a warming trend appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

By Christian Edwards, CNN

(CNN) — US President Donald Trump has once again questioned whether NATO allies would “be there” if the United States “ever needed them,” claiming that the alliance’s troops “stayed a little back” from the frontlines in Afghanistan.

“I’ve always said, ‘Will they be there, if we ever needed them?’ And that’s really the ultimate test. And I’m not sure of that. I know that we would have been there, or we would be there, but will they be there?” Trump said Thursday in an interview with Fox News in Davos, Switzerland.

In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the US became the first and so far only NATO member to invoke Article 5, which states that an attack against one member is an attack against all. For 20 years, NATO allies and other partner countries fought alongside US troops in Afghanistan – a sacrifice Trump has routinely downplayed.

“We’ve never needed them. We have never really asked anything of them. You know, they’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan, or this or that. And they did – they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines,” he said.

The president’s comments have rankled US allies in NATO, coming at the end of a week in which he has severely strained the alliance through his repeated threats to seize control of Greenland, an autonomous part of Denmark, another NATO member.

While in absolute terms the US lost by far the most troops of any NATO country in Afghanistan, some European countries – with much smaller populations than the US – lost almost as many troops in relative terms.

Around 3,500 allied troops died in the conflict, of which 2,456 were Americans and 457 were British. Denmark, with a population of around 5 million when the invasion began, lost more than 40 troops.

Since the turn of the year, Trump has repeatedly questioned NATO’s willingness to support the US. “I DOUBT NATO WOULD BE THERE FOR US IF WE REALLY NEEDED THEM,” he blasted on Truth Social on January 7. “We will always be there for NATO, even if they won’t be there for us.”

Before Trump’s comments to Fox News, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte had pushed back at the president’s previous attempts to diminish the alliance’s willingness to support the US.

“There was one thing I heard you say yesterday and today – you were not absolutely sure that Europeans would come to the rescue of the US if you will be attacked,” Rutte said Wednesday in Davos, sitting next to Trump. “Let me tell you – they will. And they did in Afghanistan, as you know.”

“For every two Americans who paid the ultimate price, there was one soldier from another NATO country that did not come back to his family,” Rutte said. “This is important. It pains me if you think it is not.”

British lawmakers across the political spectrum were also outraged by Trump’s comments.

“NATO’s Article 5 has only been triggered once. The UK and NATO allies answered the US call. And more than 450 British personnel lost their lives in Afghanistan,” said Defense Secretary John Healey. “Those British troops should be remembered for who they were: heroes who gave their lives in service of our nation.”

Emily Thornberry, chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, said Trump’s comments were an “abs