Category Archives: World News

Uprooted by partition: ‘I feel I don’t belong in England. I’m a very proud Punjabi’

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Impact of ‘traumatic period’ still lingers with those now based in UK – and their families – 75 years on

After living in Britain for nearly half a century, Pabitra Ghosh is still gripped by a rootlessness borne after being displaced from modern-day Bangladesh as a child.

When a communal riot broke out in 1950, Ghosh, then five, fled with his family across the newly carved Indian border from East Pakistan. The train journey was both “bedlam” and “traumatic” as they abandoned their home to start afresh in Kolkata.

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‘I daren’t go far’: Taliban rules trap Afghan women with no male guardian

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Those without a male relative to act as a mahram are in legal limbo and unable to travel long distances

Hasina* cannot send her two daughters to school, because they are teenagers and high school is banned for girls in Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

But she cannot take them out of the country to finish their education because she is a divorced single mother, and women are barred from long-distance travel without a male “guardian” to escort them.

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Japanese nurseries’ take-home dirty nappy rule perplexes parents

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Survey reveals common practice is seen as ‘strange’ by parents handed child’s soiled nappies to take home

Waiting lists for Japanese nurseries are finally falling, but many parents have found that securing one of the coveted places comes at a price – taking home their child’s soiled nappies.

A survey has shone a light on the common but rarely discussed practice, with about 40% of towns and cities in Japan saying they demand the guardians of their infant clientele take their used nappies with them.

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Anne Heche ‘peacefully taken off life support’ after death announcement

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The actor, severely injured in a car crash on 5 August, had been legally declared dead, but had life support maintained to facilitate organ donation

Anne Heche has been taken off life support, a family representative said, following the announcement of her death on Friday.

Heche, 53, had been severely injured in a single-vehicle car crash on 5 August, and had suffered a “severe anoxic brain injury”, according to a statement to CNN by Heche’s family. Her “brain death” was confirmed on Friday, meeting a legal definition of death in California, but it is understood life support was maintained to facilitate organ donation. A family representative said she had been “peacefully taken off life support” on Sunday.

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Japan ministers visit war shrine as South Korea calls for end to historical tensions

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Japan PM Fumio Kishida sends offering but stays away from Yasukuni, which honours dead including class-A war criminals

Japan’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, sent a ritual offering to a controversial war shrine on Monday – the anniversary of Japan’s defeat in the second world war – as one of its wartime victims, South Korea, called for an end to historical tensions.

Kishida apparently decided to stay away from the Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo to avoid antagonising South Korea and China, but three of his ministers have made the pilgrimage in recent days.

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Marshall Islands, haven from Covid for two years, gets 3,000 cases in space of weeks

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Pacific country had recorded no community transmission of the virus until last week, and healthcare is struggling to cope

After dodging the Covid-19 pandemic for two years, the Marshall Islands is grappling to control the spread of infections, which have tripled since the first community transmissions were detected a week ago.

The number of positive cases in the north Pacific nation, which has a population of about 60,000 people, has skyrocketed to more than 3,000 cases with four Covid-linked deaths and seven hospital admissions.

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Svika Pick, Israel’s ‘king of pop’, dies aged 72

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Songwriter behind hits including 1998 Eurovision winner, and Quentin Tarantino’s father-in-law, dies at home

Svika Pick, a prolific songwriter and musician who was known as Israel’s “king of pop” and by the moniker the Maestro, has died at the age of 72.

He died on Sunday in his home. The cause of death is yet to be announced.

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Afghanistan: NGOs call for assets to be unfrozen to end ‘near universal poverty’

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One year since the Taliban regained power, charities say urgent action needed to address economic crisis

One year on from the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan, a group of 32 Afghan and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are urging the international community not to abandon the country’s people, but instead address the root causes of the its economic crisis, stand up for human rights and increase humanitarian aid.

Reflecting a concern that the deep ideological deadlock between the Taliban and the international community is consigning millions of Afghans to destitution, they call for a clear roadmap that will lead to the restoration of the basic functions of the Afghan central bank and the release of Afghanistan’s assets frozen abroad, mainly in the US. The NGOs call for the disbursement of badly needed Afghan banknotes that have been printed but are impounded in Poland.

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Number of EU citizens moving to UK plunges post-Brexit – report

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Data shows just 43,000 EU citizens received visas for work, family, study or other purposes in 2021

The number of EU citizens moving to the UK has plunged since Brexit closed the doors to low-paid workers, according to a report.

The dramatic decline in migration from the EU has hit hospitality and support services hard. But the Migration Observatory (MO) at the University of Oxford and ReWage, a group of independent experts, have said that while Brexit “exacerbated” chronic labour shortages in Britain, it was not the only cause.

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One dead and 17 injured after car plows into crowd at Pennsylvania event

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Crash happened at fund-raiser for victims of fire that killed 10 on 5 August as suspect then went on to kill his mother, police say

One person died and another 17 people were injured when a car plowed into a crowd gathered at a Pennsylvania bar Saturday evening for a fundraiser benefiting families devastated by a house fire that killed 10 earlier this month, according to authorities.

The driver was arrested shortly afterward in connection with the beating death of his mother nearby, police added.

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Man fatally shoots himself after driving car into barricade near US Capitol

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Police did not determine motive for the man’s actions, but no indication he was targeting Congress members, who are in recess

A man drove into a barricade near the US Capitol in Washington DC on early Sunday morning, fired several shots into the air after his vehicle ignited, and then shot himself to death, according to police.

Officials were quick to note they had not determined a motive for the man’s actions, though they did say there was no indication he was targeting any Congress members, who were in recess at the time.

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At least 41 people killed in Egypt church fire, say officials

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Security sources say majority of dead are children after blaze breaks out at Coptic Abu Sifin church in Giza

A fire sparked by an electrical fault at a packed church in a working-class district of Greater Cairo has killed at least 41 people and injured another 45, Egyptian officials have said.

About 5,000 people had gathered at the Coptic Abu Sifin church in Imbaba, Giza, for Sunday morning services, when a fire broke out just before 9am local time (7am BST).

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US congressional delegation visits Taiwan on heels of Pelosi trip

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Five-member group including a senator will meet president and attend banquet hosted by foreign minister

A US congressional delegation has arrived in Taiwan, days after China held military drills around the island in retaliation for the House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit.

The five-member delegation, led by Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts, will meet President Tsai Ing-wen and attend a banquet hosted by the foreign minister, Joseph Wu, during the visit, according to Taiwan’s foreign ministry.

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Revealed: Indonesian workers on UK farm ‘at risk of debt bondage’

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As farms look further afield for labour, investigation finds Kent pickers saying they struggle to pay fees charged by unlicensed brokers

Indonesian labourers picking berries on a farm that supplies Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Tesco say they have been saddled with debts of up to £5,000 by unlicensed foreign brokers to work in Britain for a single season.

Pickers at the farm in Kent were initially given zero-hours contracts, and at least one was paid less than £300 a week after the cost of using a caravan was deducted, according to payslips and other documents seen as part of a Guardian investigation.

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‘We must forget about divisions’: one woman’s journey home 75 years after India’s partition

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Chance encounter on Facebook led Reena Varma, 90, to visit family home she was forced to abandon in 1947

For decades, Reena Varma would return to her home in Rawalpindi in her dreams. She would wander down the narrow lane to the three-storey house and walk through the rooms where she had lived with her five siblings, parents and an aunt for the first 15 years of her life.

But for 75 years, this was a home located across a seemingly impenetrable national border, one Varma could only visit as a painful memory. That was, until July this year. Now 90 years old but still sprightly, a chance encounter on a Facebook group helped her find and visit the family home she was forced to abandon 75 years ago, located in what is now Pakistan.

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Saudi Aramco profits soar by 90% as energy prices rise

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The $48bn figure from world’s biggest oil firm is thought to be one of largest quarterly profits in history

Saudi Arabia’s largely state-owned energy firm has highlighted the colossal profits made by gas and oil-rich nations during the energy crisis by revealing profits in the three months to the end of June up 90% to $48bn (£40bn).

Saudi Aramco recorded what is believed to be one of the largest quarterly profits in history to easily beat the near $26bn it made a year earlier.

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Police chief quit after abuse by British colonial troops in Kenya covered up

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Documentary reveals how Britain was not only involved in rape and torture but tried to suppress evidence

A former police commissioner resigned after attempts to expose rape and torture by British colonial forces in Kenya during the Mau Mau uprising were covered up, a documentary shows.

During the 1950s, Britain fought a war in Kenya against the Mau Mau, a movement that fought for independence from colonial rule. The movement was brutally suppressed through the use of widespread detention camps and systemic violence.

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Gazprom has increased gas supply to Hungary, says official

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Russian state-owned firm delivering more gas through TurkStream pipeline than ‘contractually obliged’

Gazprom has ramped up flows to Hungary through the TurkStream pipeline that transports gas via Bulgaria and Serbia, a Hungarian foreign ministry official has said.

The Russian state-owned company started delivering more gas than it was contractually obliged to on Friday, Menczer Tamás, an official in Hungary’s ministry of foreign affairs and trade, wrote in a Facebook post on Saturday.

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EU border agency accused of exploiting interpreters ‘paid under €2.50 an hour’

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Petition accuses Frontex of violating European standards by using contractor that offers low wages

The EU border agency Frontex has been accused of exploiting staff by using a contractor who it is claimed offers interpreters an effective wage of less than €2.50 (£2.11) an hour.

The European Border and Coast Guard Agency, the EU’s best-funded agency with a budget of €754m, is being petitioned by interpreters who work with vulnerable asylum seekers in places such as Greece, Italy and the Canary Islands.

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