Category Archives: World News

Toronto: Sikh guards fired or demoted over ‘humiliating’ facial hair policy

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Staff at homeless shelters required to be ‘clean-shaven’ to ensure N95 masks fit but for Sikh facial hair is key expression of faith

More than one hundred Sikh security guards in Toronto have lost their jobs or been demoted after refusing to cut their beards in order to wear a face mask, highlighting a city policy that critics describe as discriminatory and “humiliating”.

Under Toronto’s current rules, staff at homeless shelters and other congregate settings must wear a N95 respirator when exposed to people with Covid-19 or during suspected outbreaks.

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Daphne Caruana Galizia: suspect confesses to killing Maltese journalist

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George Degiorgio says he would have asked for bigger payment for murder had he known more about victim

One of the men accused of detonating the car bomb that killed the anti-corruption journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia has confessed to the crime and said he would have asked for a bigger fee for the murder had he known more about her.

George Degiorgio, who along with his brother Alfred and an associate, Vince Muscat, has been charged with murdering Caruana Galizia in Malta in October 2017, also said he would implicate others in the plot to kill her.

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Snow at one of world’s highest observatories melting earlier than ever before

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Peak at Sonnblick in Austrian Alps has melted more than a month before previous record time

The snow at the highest observatory in the world to be operated all-year-round is expected to completely melt in the next few days, the earliest time on record.

Scientists at the Sonnblick observatory in the Austrian Central Alps, which is 3,106 metres (10,190ft) above sea level, have been shocked and dismayed to see the snow depleting so quickly.

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China imposes Covid lockdown in Xi’an after handful of cases

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Zero-Covid strategy shuts down north-central city of 13 million following 18 reported cases of Omicron

A highly transmissible Omicron subvariant, which is already dominant in Britain and the US, has sent parts of the ancient Chinese city of Xi’an, home to 13 million, into a seven-day lockdown.

Businesses, schools and restaurants in Xi’an will close for one week, officials said on Tuesday, after the Chinese city logged a handful of Covid-19 cases. The capital city of Shaanxi province has reported 18 cases since Saturday in a cluster driven by the fast-spreading Omicron variant, according to official notices.

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Zimbabwe to introduce gold coins as local currency tumbles

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Soaring inflation piling pressure on country already struggling with shortages and stirring memories of Mugabe chaos

Zimbabwe will start issuing gold coins as legal tender in late July, its central bank has said, as the country battles to control runaway inflation that has considerably weakened the local currency.

The inflation rate more than doubled last month to 191%, stoking memories of the hyperinflation of the 2000s that saw the Zimbabwean dollar redenominated three times before being effectively abandoned in 2009.

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Critics told ‘lives at stake’ over Belgium-Iran prisoner swap treaty

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Belgian justice minister tells MPs if bill not approved threat to Belgian interests will increase

Belgian politicians who support a treaty that would permit the swap of an Iranian diplomat jailed in Belgium for Belgians held prisoner in Tehran have told the treaty’s opponents that “lives are at stake”.

MPs were told during a debate on Tuesday that there were serious risks to Belgians being kept in Iran if they voted against ratifying the treaty, which is set to be a first of its kind among European countries.

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Villagers massacred in western Ethiopia, says state-appointed body

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Prime minister Abiy Ahmed blames Oromo Liberation Army but group says government-allied militias behind attacks

An unknown number of villagers have been killed in an ethnically motivated massacre in western Ethiopia, the country’s state-appointed rights body said, in the latest wave of violence following a mass killing in mid-June.

The Oromia region, where the Amhara are a minority ethnic group, has experienced outbreaks of violence for many years, rooted in grievances about political marginalisation and neglect by the central government.

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Director Paul Haggis released from hotel detention following sexual abuse claim

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Director’s lawyer says prosecutors in Italy are deciding whether to investigate allegation he had sex with a woman without consent

A judge in southern Italy on Monday ordered the film director Paul Haggis released from detention at his hotel while prosecutors decide whether to pursue their investigation of whether he allegedly had sex with a woman without her consent over two days, his lawyer said.

Michele Laforgia told the Associated Press that his client Haggis, who is also a screenwriter and an Academy Award winner, was still in Italy. The ruling was made by Judge Vilma Gilli, based in Puglia, which is the region that forms the “heel” of the Italian peninsula.

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Female trafficking survivor targeted for UK removal to Rwanda, says charity

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Exclusive: Women for Refugee Women says it is in touch with first woman considered for removal

A woman in immigration detention has been targeted for removal to Rwanda, a UK refugee charity has said.

Women for Refugee Women said it was in touch with a survivor of trafficking who was recently issued with a notice of intent that she was being considered for removal to Rwanda.

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Hongkongers who fled to UK criticise lack of mental health support

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Advocacy groups and BNO passport holders say not enough is being done to help them after arriving in Britain

The UK is not doing enough to provide mental health support to thousands of Hongkongers who have fled China’s increasingly authoritarian grip, according to advocacy groups and those politically displaced.

Following China’s introduction of a sweeping national security law on Hong Kong and swift clampdown on dissent, tens of thousands of residents with British national (overseas) (BNO) passports and their dependants were granted the right to live and work in the UK in 2021.

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Anger as families of US detainees in Middle East left off Blinken call

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‘Infuriating’ exclusions made just weeks before Joe Biden’s Saudi visit and expected rapprochement with the crown prince

Family members of several US nationals who are being held in Saudi Arabia and Egypt were not invited to attend a recent call with Antony Blinken, the secretary of state, in a move that was called “infuriating and discriminatory” by one critic.

The apparent decision to exclude the families from a 22 June call between Blinken and relatives of US nationals who are hostages or otherwise wrongfully detained in Russia, Venezuela, Rwanda and other countries, was made just weeks before Joe Biden’s controversial trip to the Middle East and an expected rapprochement between the US president and Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, Mohammed bin Salman, the crown prince.

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Neglect Africa now and we will face labour shortages globally, IMF warns

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West’s response to effects of Covid and Ukraine war condemned as shortsighted ‘collective failure’ to invest in future human capital

The international community would be “playing with fire” if it failed to help Africa recover from Covid and the impact of the Ukraine war, the International Monetary Fund’s director for the continent has said.

Failure to invest and support the continent was shortsighted and detrimental to the global economy, as half of the new entrants into the global workforce over the next decade would come from sub-Saharan Africa, Abebe Aemro Selassie, director of the IMF’s Africa department, told the Guardian.

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Police arrest person of interest in mass killing that targeted Chicago-area Fourth of July parade – latest updates

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At least six killed and 30 injured after shooting in Highland Park just after 10am local time

In a new statement, Biden condemned the shooting in Highland Park as a “senseless act of violence” and vowed to deliver the “full support of the federal government to assist.” As the search continues for the gunman, Biden said he had “surged” the federal law enforcement response and was monitoring the situation closely.

Jill and I are shocked by the senseless gun violence that has yet again brought grief to an American community on this Independence Day. As always, we are grateful for the first responders and law enforcement on the scene. I have spoken to Governor Pritzker and Mayor Rotering, and have offered the full support of the Federal government to their communities. I also surged federal law enforcement to assist in the urgent search for the shooter, who remains at large at this time.

Members of the community should follow guidance from leadership on the ground, and I will monitor closely as we learn more about those whose lives have been lost and pray for those who are in the hospital with grievous injuries.

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Ukrainian flag arrives in Snake Island after Russian retreat

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Ukraine officials clarify initial confusion as to whether the flag has been raised, saying it is there but will be hoisted only once troops arrive

Ukrainian forces are set to raise the country’s flag on Snake Island, a strategic and symbolic outpost in the Black Sea that Russian troops retreated from last week after months of heavy bombardment.

“The military operation has been concluded, and … the territory, Snake Island, has been returned to the jurisdiction of Ukraine,” Natalia Humeniuk, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern military command, told reporters.

This article and its headline were amended on Tuesday 5 July 2022 to take in the update of when the flag would be raised on Snake Island.

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Ukraine PM calls for confiscated assets from Russian oligarchs to fund recovery – as it happened

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This live blog is now closed, you can find our latest coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war here

Ukrainian media reports an ammunition depot was destroyed in occupied Snizhne in the eastern Donetsk region. Nexta TV has this unverified footage of what it claims to be the incident.

Russian forces hit a secondary school in the Kharkiv district at 4am this morning, according to a report from Oleh Synyehubov, governor of the region. There were no reported casualties.

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Starmer ends Labour silence on Brexit as he rules out rejoining single market

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Labour leader says he will rebuild trust with EU and get ‘a better deal for the British people’

Keir Starmer has thrown Labour back into the Brexit debate by ruling out any return to the single market or customs union, but arguing he could remove trade and travel barriers as prime minister because the EU would trust him.

In a speech on Monday evening that ended Labour’s habitual silence on the subject since the referendum, Starmer pledged to tackle what he called a “fatberg of red tape and bureaucracy” caused by Johnson’s Brexit deal.

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Italian glacier collapse: rescuers hampered by thunderstorms

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Visiting scene, Italian PM says country must take measures to ensure such a tragedy does not happen again

Thunderstorms have hampered the search for more than a dozen hikers who remain unaccounted for a day after a huge chunk of an Alpine glacier in Italy broke off, sending an avalanche of ice, snow and rocks down the slope.

The Italian prime minister, Mario Draghi, pledged on Monday night that his government would work to avoid a repeat of the tragedy in which at least seven people were killed.

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Family of activist jailed in Egypt urge Liz Truss to pressure counterpart

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Family of Alaa Abd El Fattah join wife of Karim Ennarah, under travel ban, in demanding more action from foreign secretary

The family of a British national jailed in Egypt and the British wife of an Egyptian rights defender under a travel ban are demanding that Liz Truss do more to pressure her Egyptian counterpart when they meet this week.

The foreign secretary is expected to meet Egypt’s foreign minister, Sameh Shoukry, in London after telling parliament in June that she would seek a meeting with him and raise the case of detained British-Egyptian activist Alaa Abd El Fattah. “We’re working very hard to secure his release,” she said.

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Putin declares victory in Luhansk after fall of Lysychansk

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Region’s governor says loss was painful and he expects Sloviansk and Bakhmut now to face heavy attack

Vladimir Putin has declared victory in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk and told Russian troops to rest and “increase their combat capabilities”, a day after Ukrainian forces withdrew from their last remaining stronghold in the province.

Ukraine’s military command confirmed on Sunday evening that its troops had been forced to pull back from the city of Lysychansk in Luhansk, and the regional governor has warned that Russian forces are trying to seize the entire Donetsk region, which, with Luhansk, makes up the industrial heartland of Donbas.

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Ukraine lays out $750bn ‘recovery plan’ for postwar future

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Volodymyr Zelenskiy says process of recovery will allow his country to deepen its links with Europe

The eventual restoration of Ukraine through a $750bn (£620bn) recovery plan is the common task of the entire democratic world, the Ukrainian president said on Monday at the first detailed event to map out a physical future for the country in the event it survives as a western-facing nation after the Russian invasion.

Speaking by video link to a high-level conference in Lugano, Switzerland, attended by many senior Ukrainian politicians, Volodymyr Zelenskiy admitted the task ahead was colossal, claiming the war was a battle of outlooks in which Russia was determined to destroy his country’s physical and moral fabric.

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