Category Archives: World News

Poland explosion unlikely to spark escalation – but risks of Nato-Russia clash are real

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Incident in which two people died probably falls short of threshold needed to prompt collective Nato action against Russia

• Russia-Ukraine war – latest news updates

If it was a Russian missile that struck a Polish village on Tuesday, killing two people, it would be the first time a Russian weapon has ever come down on Nato territory.

The Soviet Union and the US managed to get through the whole cold war without making such a mistake, because Washington and Moscow were well aware of the risks of going to war by accident or miscalculation.

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Sunak hints he will slow down progress on India trade deal

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Prime minister says UK should not sacrifice quality for speed as he seeks to improve terms at G20 talks

Rishi Sunak has hinted he will slow down progress on the India trade deal to improve its terms, saying the UK should not “sacrifice quality for speed”.

The comments, which preceded talks with the UK prime minister’s Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi, at the G20 on Wednesday, suggested a marked change of approach from Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, who prioritised speed and hard deadlines, having pledged a “deal for Diwali” that did not materialise.

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Iranian security forces shoot dead at least two demonstrators

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Forces opened fire as protests sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death swelled on anniversary of bloody 2019 crackdown

Iranian security forces have shot dead at least two protesters, as demonstrations sparked by Mahsa Amini’s death swelled on the anniversary of a bloody 2019 crackdown.

The protesters were responding to a call to commemorate those slain in the 2019 crackdown, giving new momentum to the demonstrations sparked by the death of 22-year-old Amini in mid-September this year, after her arrest for allegedly flouting Iran’s strict dress code for women.

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Trudeau raises ‘serious concerns’ about Chinese interference in talks with Xi

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Canadian prime minister met China’s president at G20 summit in Bali amid tensions over aggressive interventions by Beijing

Justin Trudeau has raised “serious concerns” over suspected domestic interference by China in his first talks with President Xi Jinping in more than three years, amid growing frustration over increasingly aggressive interventions by Beijing.

Trudeau discussed his concerns about Chinese “interference activities” in Canada on the sidelines of a Group of 20 meeting on the Indonesian island of Bali, a government source told AFP.

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Canada says imports of children’s fever medication will ease shortage

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Health Canada says it secured a foreign supply of children’s acetaminophen that will be for sale ‘in the coming weeks’

Canada’s public health agency has said that foreign shipments of children’s fever medication will help ease a nationwide shortage that has left families desperate and hospitals overwhelmed.

“We are announcing that we have secured foreign supply of children’s acetaminophen that will be available for sale at retail and in community pharmacies in the coming weeks,” Health Canada said in a release on Monday.

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Syrian amnesties freed less than 6% of detainees, report reveals

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Freeing of prisoners hailed as acts of benevolence by Assad regime still leave estimated 136,000 people in jail

Prisoner amnesties decreed by the Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad, during the country’s 10-year war have freed less than 6% of detainees, with an estimated 136,000 people remaining in state prisons, a report has revealed.

The amnesties, which were hailed as acts of benevolence by officials and Assad, have put barely a dent in the huge numbers still held in the regime’s infamous prison systems, some for years after their sentences had expired.

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Lula faces backlash after flying to Cop27 on millionaire’s private jet

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Brazil president-elect’s decision to fly on a jet owned by a health industry mogul criticised by both opponents and supporters

Brazil’s president-elect has faced a backlash at home after flying to the Cop27 environmental summit on a private jet owned by a millionaire businessman.

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was elected on 30 October and has vowed to undo much of the environmental damage wrought by the outgoing far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro.

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PM Mateusz Morawiecki calls for calm after explosion – as it happened

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Poland’s PM convenes urgent national security meeting after stray missiles feared to have crossed into Nato member country

The Ukrainian presidential adviser, Anton Gerashchenko, has published a photo purportedly from the recently liberated city of Kherson to illustrate the lack of power in the region.

“Kherson. Six days without electricity. People charge their phones on the main square from a generator brought by a volunteer,” he tweeted.

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Climate activists throw black liquid at Gustav Klimt painting in Vienna

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Pair attack Death and Life painting in Leopold Museum in protest against fossil fuel ‘death sentence’

Climate activists in Austria have attacked a painting by Gustav Klimt, with one throwing a black, oily liquid at it and another gluing himself to the glass covering the painting.

Members of Letzte Generation Österreich (Last Generation Austria) tweeted that they had targeted the 1915 painting Death and Life at the Leopold Museum in Vienna to protest against their government’s use of fossil fuels.

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Germans turning 18 to be offered €200 culture pass ‘birthday present’

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Voucher aims to rekindle interest in live arts and boost industry after pandemic

Young Germans are to join other Europeans in being offered a voucher to spend on their choice of cultural offerings under a scheme launched by the government.

The €200 Kulturpass, which will be made available to all 18-year-olds, has twin aims: to encourage young adults to experience live culture and drop stay-at-home pandemic habits; and give a financial boost to the arts scene, which has yet to recover from repeated lockdowns.

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Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games mascots likened to ‘clitoris in trainers’

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Pair of red triangular Phryges meant to represent floppy conical hats linked to French Revolution

France’s mascots for the 2024 Olympic Games have been likened to a giant “clitoris in trainers”, with the French newspaper Libération hailing it as a revolutionary departure from the traditional phallic symbol of the Eiffel Tower.

When the two triangular red mascots, the Phryges, were unveiled for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, they were presented as the shape of Phrygian caps, the floppy, conical hats associated with the French Revolution.

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Alaa Abd el-Fattah has ended hunger strike, sister says

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British-Egyptian political prisoner had been on a partial hunger strike of 100 calories or less a day for six months

Alaa Abd el-Fattah, the British-Egyptian democracy activist jailed in Egypt, has told his family in a letter that he has ended his six-month-long hunger strike, which he began in protest against his detention conditions.

“I’ve broken my strike. I’ll explain everything on Thursday,” he told them, in reference to his monthly family prison visits to the Wadi el-Natrun desert prison where he is being held. The democracy activist was sentenced to a further five years in prison last year for sharing a social media post about torture, shortly after gaining British citizenship through his mother.

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G20’s dysfunctional family show little sign of working together in a crisis

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Communique unlikely to stretch beyond usual platitudes despite the need for a global plan for recovery

The Cambodian prime minister, Hun Sen, was struck down by Covid, the Argentinian prime minister, Alberto Fernández, had gastroenteritis and the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, either did or did not have chest pains that sent him to hospital. Given that Indonesia’s G20 slogan plastered all around Bali says: “Recover Together, Recover Stronger”, it was not an auspicious performance by the world’s leaders.

Unfortunately, there is precious little sign of recovery at the G20, either at a political or economic level.

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Palestinian man kills two Israelis in West Bank settlement

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Authorities shoot 18-year-old dead after knife and car attack in territory occupied by Israel

A Palestinian man killed two Israeli people and wounded four others in an attack at a settlement in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday before he was shot and killed by Israeli security personnel, Israeli paramedics and Palestinian officials said.

The Magen David Adom paramedic service said the two were killed in the settlement of Ariel. The four wounded were taken to hospital in a serious condition.

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India’s energy conundrum: committed to renewables but still expanding coal

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Critics says India’s plans to increase coal production to 1bn tonnes a year are environmentally devastating and unnecessary

Three days before India’s environment minister boarded a flight to Egypt for this year’s UN climate summit, Cop27, the country’s finance minister was busy with a new announcement.

“India needs greater investment in coal production,” said Nirmala Sitharaman at the Delhi launch of India’s biggest ever coalmine auction, where 141 new sites for coalmines will be sold off to the highest bidder.

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The Egyptian human rights activists unable to attend Cop27

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Conference in Sharm el-Sheikh follows decade-long crackdown on civil society in Egypt

“Honestly, what I want is to be in Sharm el-Sheikh and just scream,” said Amr Magdi of Human Rights Watch. Like dozens of other prominent human rights defenders, researchers and environmentalists, Magdi has been unable to attend Cop27 as he is exiled from Egypt because of his work.

“I just want to tell everyone about the injustice happening in Egypt. I can’t do it personally and I’m trying to do it with my work. I’m even helping others who are able to travel there to do this,” he said.

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Crypto exchange FTX expects to have more than 1m creditors

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Bankruptcy filing says ‘questions arose’ about founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s leadership

The collapsed crypto exchange FTX expects to have more than 1 million individual creditors, the company has said in its first bankruptcy filing, scattered across more than 100 companies in the wider group.

According to the filing at the bankruptcy court in the US state of Delaware, where FTX US is based, Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder and chief executive, stepped down at 4.30am on Friday, “after consultation with his own legal counsel”.

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Israel will not cooperate with FBI inquiry into killing of Palestinian American journalist

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Defence minister calls investigation into Shireen Abu Akleh’s killing by Israeli army ‘interference in internal affairs’

Israel has said it will not cooperate with an FBI investigation into the killing of the Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh by the Israeli army.

Israel’s defence minister, Benny Gantz, denounced the inquiry as “interference in Israel’s internal affairs” and said he “made it clear to the American representatives that we stand behind the IDF [Israel defence forces] soldiers, that we will not cooperate with any external investigation”.

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Chaotic scenes in southern Chinese city as Covid curbs fuel unrest

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People break barriers and argue with workers in hazmat suits in Guangzhou amid zero-Covid policy

Crowds of people in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou crashed through Covid barriers and marched down streets in chaotic scenes on Monday night, according to videos posted online, in a show of public resentment over government restrictions.

Among the latest outbreaks in China, Guangzhou has the biggest caseload, with new daily infections of Covid-19 exceeding 5,000 for the first time and fuelling speculation that localised lockdowns could widen.

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Russia strives to avoid G20 isolation as China and India distance themselves

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Traditional allies voice concern over Ukraine war as draft communique highlights damage to world economy

Russia has been battling to prevent diplomatic isolation at the G20 summit in Bali as its traditional allies – China and India – started to distance themselves from the war in Ukraine, which a draft communique said had caused untold economic damage to the world.

Narendra Modi, the Indian prime minister, and Xi Jinping, the president of China, both voiced concern about the war without breaking from their previous defence of Moscow.

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