Trump Says U.S. Strikes in Nigeria Were to Protect Christians

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President Trump says the US launched strikes on Islamic State targets in Nigeria to protect Christians. Plus, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky says he's meeting with Trump in Florida over the weekend. And what the Make America Healthy Again movement could mean for next year's midterms.

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It's Friday, December 26th. I'm Alex Ossola for The Wall Street Journal. We're on holiday schedule in your feed once a day. And this is What's News, the top headlines and business stories moving the world today. President Trump has announced that the US launch strikes on Islamic State targets in Nigeria on Christmas Day to protect the country's Christian population from the terrorist group. Posting on social media, Trump wrote that he had warned the group to stop killing Christians, saying, quote, there would be hell to pay and tonight there was. Trump's post didn't say how many people were killed. Nigeria's population of 237 million people is roughly split between Muslims and Christians, and the violence against Christians has escalated in northern Nigeria during the past decade. The Trump administration says Islamist groups are targeting Christians, but the Nigerian government doesn't agree. Here's Journal reporter Alexandra Wexler in Johannesburg.

Alexandra Wexler (1:39)

The Nigerians and the Americans have had some differences framing this issue. The Nigerians have been saying these Islamist groups are a big problem, but they target indiscriminately. They kill and kidnap Muslims as well as Christians.

Alex Ossola (1:55)

A Defense Department official said Nigeria's government approved the Christmas Day strikes and worked with the US to carry them out. Nigerian authorities today said that they aided the US strikes, but were adamant that the effort wasn't aimed at protecting any particular religious group. Alexandra says that the cooperation comes after President Trump last month threatened military action in Nigeria if the government didn't do more to protect Christians.

Alexandra Wexler (2:17)

And since then, the Nigerian government has made quite a big effort to engage with US officials on what is going on in Nigeria and how the US could potentially help fight some of these groups, Islamist terrorists and armed gangs that aren't necessarily affiliated with a religious group. And the Nigerian government has said repeatedly that it had worked with the US., provided intelligence to the US who then launched the actual military intervention. They discussed this attack with the US government ahead of it actually happening. They're being very careful to show that they were involved in this and that this is not the US going over their heads and attacking on Nigerian soil without the knowledge of the government.

Alex Ossola (3:07)

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said today that he would meet with President Trump in Florida on Sunday for talks on the plan to end the war with Russia. Zelensky said they would discuss security guarantees for Kiev and an economic agreement. In Asia, the Chinese government has imposed sanctions on 20 US defense companies and 10 of their executives after the Trump administration last week approved $11 billion in weapon sales to Taiwan. China's targets include Northrop Grumman, Boeing's defense unit that's based in St. Louis, and Palmer Lucky, the founder of Andrel Industries, Beijing's freezing assets and issuing bans on transactions with China. It's also prohibiting the sanctioned executives from going to mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau. The move emphasizes Beijing's claim over Taiwan but is largely symbolic because US defense contractors generally do little business in China. The US has sold arms to Taiwan for years. China said today that the US weapons approval interferes with its internal affairs and undermines its sovereignty and territorial integrity. And former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for money laundering and abuse of power in connection with the looting of the 1MDB Sovereign Wealth Fund. 1MDB is one of the largest financial crimes of the century and dates back to 2009 More than $4.5 billion was allegedly taken from the fund, with money used to buy art and put toward the Hollywood film The Wolf of Wall Street. The fallout has continued more than a decade later, with JPMorgan agreeing in August to pay $330 million to settle claims that it facilitated transactions. Joe Lo, a financier alleged to have masterminded the scheme, remains at large. Today, the Malaysian court rejected the argument from Najeeb's defense that the money Najeeb handled was sent from Saudi Arabia's royal family, not from the Sovereign Wealth Fund. He's in prison for an earlier conviction related to the 1MDB scandal, and his legal team said it would appeal this decision.