Category Archives: World News

Battles being fought in eastern Ukraine could determine the country’s fate, Ukraine’s defence ministry spokesperson says – 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

The turmoil caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has underlined the need for a free Indo-Pacific region, Joe Biden has said, at the start of a meeting with regional partners that Beijing has criticised as part of a US-led attempt to contain China.

Biden, and the leaders of a loose alliance known as the Quad – India, Japan and Australia – reaffirmed their commitment to a “free and open” Indo-Pacific during talks in Tokyo on Tuesday. The comments came one day after the US president said Washington would be ready to intervene militarily to defend Taiwan, prompting China to accuse him of “playing with fire”.

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Mountain labs turn Honduras from cocaine way station into producer

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Increase in coca plantations could give rise to a new generation of drug traffickers, and refortify the clans of old

After an hour-long hike from the nearest road, a Honduran anti-narcotics inspector with a shotgun slung from his shoulder led the way into a mountainside clearing littered with wilting coca bushes his unit had uprooted in the days before.

Black irrigation hoses crisscrossed the roughly four-acre field down to the confluence of two creeks, where, under a canopy, lay the charred remains of a makeshift laboratory for processing the coca leaves into paste – the precursor of cocaine.

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Joe Biden: invasion of Ukraine shows need for free and open Indo-Pacific

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Leaders of US, India, Japan and Australia meet in Tokyo for Quad summit Beijing claims is an attempt to contain China

The turmoil caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has underlined the need for a free Indo-Pacific region, Joe Biden has said at a meeting with regional partners that Beijing has condemned as part of a US-led attempt to contain China.

Biden and the leaders of a loose alliance known as the Quad – India, Japan and Australia – reaffirmed their commitment to a “free and open” Indo-Pacific during talks in Tokyo on Tuesday. The comments came one day after the US president said Washington would be ready to intervene militarily to defend Taiwan, prompting China to accuse him of “playing with fire”.

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Capitol rioter who sprayed police with fire extinguisher sentenced to three years

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Matthew Ryan Miller from Maryland draped himself in a far right-affiliated flag and used a barricade as a ladder to scale walls

A Maryland man who draped himself in a far right-affiliated flag and sprayed a fire extinguisher at police during the deadly Capitol attack on January 6 has been sentenced to nearly three years in prison, according to federal court records.

Matthew Ryan Miller, 23, pleaded guilty in February to felony obstruction of an official proceeding – that day’s joint congressional session to certify Joe Biden’s win over Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election – as well as assaulting, resisting or impeding police officers.

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Airbnb to close in China amid repeated Covid lockdowns

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With pandemic restrictions showing no sign of ending, home rental service says it will cease taking bookings for accommodation inside China from 30 July

Airbnb is closing down its business inside China indefinitely, as the country’s zero-Covid policy, lockdowns and travel restrictions continue.

On Tuesday Airbnb told its China-based users it would cease taking all bookings for accommodation and experiences in China from 30 July. The ability to book for dates beyond 29 July was suspended on Tuesday morning, according to screenshots of the Airbnb notice shared across Chinese social media. An attempt by the Guardian to make bookings from outside China after that date produced an error message.

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Sisters allegedly murdered by husbands in Pakistan ‘honour’ killing

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Six men arrested after Pakistani-Spanish women tricked into travelling to Gujrat where they were shot

Two sisters with dual Pakistani and Spanish citizenship were allegedly killed by their husbands, uncle and brother in a so-called “honour” killing a day after they were tricked into travelling to Pakistan.

Aneesa Abbas, 24, and Arooj Abbas, 21, were strangled and shot dead on Friday after arriving in the eastern city of Gujrat with their mother, Azra Bibi.

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European fruit with traces of most toxic pesticides ‘up 53% in nine years’

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Analysis of nearly 100,000 samples found residues in a third of apples and half of blackberries

Contamination of fresh fruits by the most hazardous pesticides has dramatically increased in Europe over the past decade, according to a nine-year study of government data.

A third of apples and half of all blackberries surveyed had residues of the most toxic categories of pesticides, some of which have been linked to illnesses including cancer, heart disease and birth deformities.

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Ukraine destruction: how the Guardian documented Russia’s use of illegal weapons

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Cluster bombs, fléchettes and unguided missiles on residential areas: as prosecutors investigate alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine, our reporters reveal the evidence they discovered on the ground

At about midnight on 1 March 2022, a Russian air force jet dropped a series of 250kg Soviet-era explosives over Borodyanka, north of Kyiv. They were powerful FAB-250 bombs, designed to hit military targets such as enemy fortifications and bunkers. There were no such structures, however, in this quiet town of 13,000 people.

The bombs fell on at least five residential buildings, splitting them in two. Dozens of bodies were found under the rubble when the Russians withdrew from the Kyiv region in early April, leaving in their path a gigantic crime scene that Ukrainian prosecutors investigating alleged war crimes by Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, have been working on for weeks.

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Roman sculpture up for auction in US linked to disgraced dealer

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Exclusive: researcher calls for sale of marble head of Greek philosopher Antisthenes to be halted

An archaeologist is calling for a US auction house to withdraw a monumental Roman sculpture from sale, claiming he has photographic evidence of its direct link to a dealer involved with illicit trade.

Prof Christos Tsirogiannis, whose academic research focuses on antiquities and trafficking networks, said Hindman Auctions in Chicago should cancel its auction of the portrait head of Antisthenes, the Greek philosopher, scheduled for Thursday.

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Top official at Foreign Office called upon to resign over Kabul withdrawal

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Sir Philip Barton castigated along with Dominic Raab in damning report by MPs into UK’s chaotic exit

The senior civil servant in charge of the Foreign Office should consider his position after presiding over a disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan that betrayed UK allies, put lives in danger, showed a total absence of planning and was chaotically managed, MPs have concluded in a damning report.

The report from the foreign affairs select committee said the absence of leadership – both ministerial and official, including the permanent secretary, Sir Philip Barton – when Kabul fell was inexcusable and a grave indictment on those supposedly in charge. It added that Barton failed to give candid evidence to the committee, and says as a result it had lost confidence in him. The committee also accused him of covering up political interference in the fast-tracking of some individuals out of Afghanistan.

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Surgeon casts doubt on Johnny Depp’s account of how he severed finger

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Richard Moore says he is sceptical of claim that Depp injured finger during Amber Heard fight, as defamation trial enters final week

The defamation trial of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard entered its fifth and final week of testimony on Monday, with a witness for Heard testifying that Depp could not have lost the tip of his finger during a domestic fight in the way he had recounted.

The serious injury to his middle finger, which occurred during a March 2015 row in Australia between Depp and Heard during their brief marriage, has been one of several key points of dispute in the civil case.

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French minister refuses to stand down over rape allegations

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Damien Abad, appointed to the new government on Friday, denies ‘deeply wounding’ accusations

A member of France’s newly installed government who has faced accusations of rape has strongly denied the allegations and insisted he will not stand down.

Damien Abad, 42, appointed the minister for solidarity and the disabled, was forced to make a statement after two women accused him of rape in 2010 and 2011.

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Bolivia’s perennial student leader clung to post for decades without graduating

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Max Mendoza has been arrested after a judge said his 32-year enrollment at university on a government salary may be a crime

Max Mendoza has been a remarkably persistent student – and a profitable one: he has been enrolled at a public university in Bolivia for 32 years but never graduated, much of it while being paid a government salary to serve as a student leader.

On Monday, though, he was detained and sent to jail after a judge ordered a six-month investigation into allegations his tenure as a state-paid student leader constituted a crime.

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Deadly Indian heatwave made 30 times more likely by climate crisis

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Soaring temperatures in subcontinent, which have caused widespread suffering, would be extraordinarily rare without global heating

The heatwave scorching India and Pakistan has been made 30 times more likely by the climate crisis, according to scientists. Extreme temperatures and low rainfall since mid-March have caused widespread suffering, including deaths, crop losses, forest fires, and cuts to power and water supplies.

The study is the latest to show the already severe impacts of global heating on millions of people, even though the global average temperature has risen only 1.2C above pre-industrial levels to date. If it rises to 2C, heatwaves as intense as the current one would be expected as often as every five years in India and Pakistan, the scientists estimated.

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Why are monkeypox cases suddenly emerging across the world and could the virus have mutated?

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Data prior to current outbreaks suggested resurgence of the disease, with waning immunity from smallpox vaccination contributing to spread

The sudden emergence of monkeypox in several countries has raised questions about how the virus, which is most common in central and west Africa, has managed to spread.

Many health experts have said the monkeypox cases in 12 countries are not cause for panic, given the virus is much less infectious than illnesses like Covid and rarely fatal, but it is highly unusual.

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Iran vows to avenge killing as it buries Revolutionary Guard colonel

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Finger of blame pointed at Israel after Hassan Sayad Khodayari shot dead in Tehran

An Iranian colonel shot dead in Tehran by assailants on motorcycles has been buried as officials vowed to avenge an assassination that they continue to lay at the feet of Israel.

The murder of Col Hassan Sayad Khodayari is the highest-profile killing of an Iranian official since the violent death of top Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh in November 2020 and appears to fit a pattern of assassinations that began more than a decade ago.

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Sole survivor of 2009 Comoros plane crash recalls terrifying ordeal

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Bahia Bakari, who was 12 at the time, tells French court of the moments leading up to crash in which 152 died

A woman who was 12 when she became the sole survivor of the 2009 Yemenia Airways crash in the Comoros islands that killed all 152 others on board has described the terrifying moments leading up to her plunge into the ocean and subsequent rescue as part of the French trial against the airline.

Bahia Bakari, 25, has sat through several hearings with her father but had not testified or spoken to journalists attending the trial, which opened this month.

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Zelenskiy says Putin is the only Russian official he is willing to meet with to discuss how to end the war – 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

The RIA news agency reports that Russia’s defence ministry says its forces destroyed a Ukrainian unit of US-produced M777 howitzers, a type of artillery weapon.

The claim has not been independently verified.

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Up to 100 Ukraine troops could be dying in Donbas each day, says Zelenskiy

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President gives insight into country’s casualties, as Luhansk governor says Russia using ‘scorched-earth’ tactics

Ukraine’s president has given an insight into the level of losses being suffered by Ukrainian forces in the Donbas, saying between 50 to 100 Ukrainians could be dying every day.

While Ukraine and its allies have made much of Russian losses since the war began, the issue of Ukrainian casualties has been something of a black hole.

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Germany to relax visa rules for Russian workers despite spy warning

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Process to be eased to exempt applicants with special expertise from case-by-case assessment

Germany is to relax visa requirements for skilled workers from Russia, just as the country’s domestic intelligence agency warned of a heightened risk that Russian nationals working for German firms could be recruited for industrial espionage.

The chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government is streamlining the visa application process by exempting Russian workers with specialised expertise in areas such as IT and communication technology from case-by-case assessments through the federal employment department.

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