Ukraine and North Korea, LA fire wind warning and space race delays
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Today, strong winds are expected to fan the flames again in Los Angeles. Zelensky says he's ready to exchange North Korean soldiers for Ukrainians held in Russia. And this week's space race begins with a whimper, not a bang, as SpaceX and Blue Origin delay their launches. ♪

It's Monday, January 13. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes every weekday. I'm Tara Oakes in the book wall. When you hear LSEC data and analytics, what do you think of? Comprehensive data you can trust. Exclusive access to Reuters news. Industry-leading analytics and unique insights. Discover new possibilities with LSEC data and analytics.

Fire-ravaged Los Angeles is bracing for a new series of Santa Ana winds that could threaten the progress they've made. LA County Fire Chief Anthony Morrone. These winds, combined with low humidities and low fuel moistures,

will keep the fire threat in all of Los Angeles County very high. Morrone adding that evacuated areas may not be reopened until red flag conditions are lifted on Thursday. The National Weather Service forecasts that renewed winds of up to 50 to 70 miles per hour could last until Wednesday after a calmer weekend.

Our reporter Nathan Frangino has been in the vicinity of the Palisades fire. On Saturday, on the eastern edge of the Palisades fire, I saw helicopters swoop in, dousing flames with water drops over steep hillsides. Air tankers also flew in, dropping flame retardant over the fire. The pink material covered streets, homes and even vehicles in the Mandeville Canyon.

Dozens of firefighters patrolled that canyon, protecting homes from encroaching flames and raking up dried brush and other fuels that would have otherwise helped spread the fire. Susana Korda is a 53-year-old publicist who's lived in Topanga, northwest of Los Angeles, for 17 years. She called her evacuation from the Palisades fire absolutely horrifying.

She said a wall of flames extended above on both sides of the road as she, her husband Scott and her dog Miles fled. We're absolutely terrified. With the stronger winds in the forecast, Cora fears they could lose everything. So we're just praying and hoping that doesn't happen. I think it's important to highlight that this is only the beginning.

The fires are still burning. Firefighters are still arriving from out of state and even out of the country to relieve their colleagues. The death toll is still rising. Residents are still in a state of shock. And the recovery is going to take a long time. Officials have warned the entire Los Angeles County population of nearly 10 million that anyone may still be ordered to evacuate from the flames and toxic smoke.

Even so, schools, except in some mandatory evacuation areas, are set to reopen today. For more on the fires, check out our weekend episode of Reuters World News. It's available wherever you get your podcasts and linked in the pod description. In Qatar, Israel and Hamas have been handed a final draft of a Gaza ceasefire and hostage agreement. It comes after an early morning breakthrough in the Doha talks, according to an official briefed on the negotiations.

Both sides have kept a tight lid on the details amid a push to get a deal over the finish line before Donald Trump takes office. Populist Croatian President Zoran Milanovic claiming victory in the second round of a country's presidential election.

setting him up for a second term in the largely ceremonial post. Milanovic, a former prime minister, has previously confronted Prime Minister Andrei Plenkovich over foreign and public policies with the two frequently trading insults.

Oil prices extended gains for a third session on Monday, with Brent rising above $80 a barrel to its highest in more than four months. As investors ponder the full implications of the latest round of US and UK sanctions on Russian producers. The move could really bite, since it sanctions another 160 tankers of Russia's shadow fleet, taking the total to 270.

Previous tankers hit by sanctions were severely curtailed in where they could travel, and some ended up being scrapped. Analysts say the sanctions will push China and India to source more crude from the Middle East, Africa and the Americas.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy using his regular video address to send a message to North Korea's Kim Jong-un. Zelenskyy says Kyiv is ready to hand over captured North Korean soldiers, but only if North Korea can facilitate their exchange for Ukrainians held in Russia.

Mike Collet-White covers the conflict. There have been North Korean soldiers fighting alongside the Russians in this region called Kursk, where Ukraine launched a foray last August.

This has gradually kind of crept out this news. It wasn't sort of announced by anyone. The Russians still don't confirm it. But it leaked out because the Ukrainians realised they weren't just fighting Russians, they were also fighting North Korean troops. There are estimated to be some 11,000 there fighting alongside the Russians. And Seoul today came out and said they estimated that already.

There have been 3,000 killed or wounded North Korean soldiers in this particular battle. So the attrition rate is very high. And really, it's a very interesting development in this war because it is part of the

Some would say, most would say, pretty dangerous escalation as we're coming to an important period with possible peace negotiations sometime in 2025. Are those possible peace talks and the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House all playing a part here? I think so. I think that it's fairly widely accepted now that Ukraine launched this incursion into Kursk in the first place in order to improve its bargaining position.

for when negotiations finally begin, which I think they probably will have to at some stage. The overall narrative of the war is that the Russians, certainly through 2024, were taking the upper hand and they have gained more territory than they have in previous years in the war. And Ukraine is very keen to have something to bargain with as they go into possible negotiations. No liftoff today.

Anomalies during the mission countdown window have pushed back the debut launch of Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin New Glenn rocket by at least a day. The moment was supposed to be a major step towards a goal of competing with Elon Musk's SpaceX in the satellite launch market. New Glenn is roughly twice the size of SpaceX's Falcon 9, but not as powerful as SpaceX's next generation Starship rocket, which will launch its seventh test later this week after that was all

also delayed and is now scheduled for Wednesday. Starship is also at the heart of Musk's dream to colonise Mars.

Reporter Joey Roulette has been looking into that mission. Elon Musk obviously has a huge presence in the Trump world and his starships want to go to Mars. That's what they're chiefly designed for. And right now under the Artemis program, that was kind of seen as a stepping point to get to that later goal of going to Mars. But under the Trump administration, there's a lot of talk about many different goals. One being, let's just focus solely on Mars. Let's

use these starships to get there. And that, of course, raises a lot of questions about the other parts of NASA's Artemis program, like their SLS rocket, the Space Launch System.

So are we likely to see a mission to Mars in the coming years? If that happens under Trump, it's not going to be like any other program in the past. He's been talking about making some kind of human Mars mission by 2028. There's a lot of people who don't think that that's possible based on how long it takes spacecraft to develop in the past. But of course, SpaceX is a wild card because they move very, very quickly in spacecraft development. But

Launching humans to Mars is no easy task. It's unlike anything humans have ever done before. When you go, it takes about seven to nine months. And that's a small window wherein the planets align in the ideal path to get there. And then once you're there, you have to spend two years there before the planets realign into that path again and you can come back. So that's a very, very risky, ambitious mission that's not to be taken lightly. This potential shift

from the moon to Mars. Is it an either or situation?

I think these two programs, these two ambitions will be in parallel instead of being one or the other. Because if we remember, the Artemis program was largely created under Trump's first term. And the strategy there was to use the moon as a stepping point to get to Mars, as a proving ground to test technologies on the surface that could then be used to Mars. I think that's a reason why they might keep elements of the moon program in place.

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And time for today's recommended read, which is all about the world's largest gathering of humanity. More than 2 million Hindus are expected for their first ritual dip in freezing waters at the confluence of sacred rivers as the Mahakam Festival begins. You can see pictures and read more about the event by following the link in the pod description. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app.

Don't forget to follow us on your favorite podcast player, and we'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show.