Category Archives: World News

Canada charges ex-general fighting in Ukraine with sexual assault

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Retired Lt Col Trevor Cadieu preparing to return home to face two charges relating to alleged incidents in 1994 when he was a cadet

A former Canadian general who reportedly went to Ukraine to fight Russian invaders has been charged back home in Canada with sexual assault, after a months-long investigation.

Retired Lt Gen Trevor Cadieu faces two counts of sexual assault that relate to alleged incidents at Canada’s Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario in 1994 when he was a cadet, the office of the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal said in a statement.

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US says China’s support for Russia over Ukraine puts it on ‘wrong side of history’

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‘China claims to be neutral, but its behavior makes clear that it is still investing in close ties to Russia,’ state department says

Xi Jinping has assured Vladimir Putin of China’s support on Russian “sovereignty and security” prompting Washington to warn Beijing it risked ending up “on the wrong side of history”.

China has refused to condemn Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine and has been accused of providing diplomatic cover for Russia by blasting western sanctions and arms sales to Kyiv.

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US has not fully investigated own role in Yemen human rights abuses, watchdog finds

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Government Accountability Office also criticizes Biden’s move to classify Saudi weapons as ‘offensive’ or ‘defensive’ as meaningless

The US government has not fully investigated its own role in perpetuating human rights abuses in Yemen, according to a congressional watchdog report that offered a damning assessment of both the Trump and Biden administrations’ commitment to tracking violations of humanitarian law.

A report by the Government Accountability Office, which examined US weapons sales to the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, also raised serious doubts about one of Joe Biden’s first foreign policy as president, when he announced that his administration was ending US support for Saudi offensive operations in Yemen.

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‘I’d be scared to be deported’: refugees in Rwanda respond to UK plans

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Asylum seekers at Gashora transit centre say they fear reaching UK and ending up where they started after torturous journey

Many have attempted perilous crossings across the Mediterranean to reach the UK in the past. But asylum seekers at Rwanda’s Gashora transit centre say they are now too scared to try again for fear of ending up back where they started.

Zemen Fesaha, 26, from Eritrea, arrived at the sprawling complex of accommodation and leisure facilities in July. The refugee camp, an hour and a half’s drive from Rwanda’s capital, Kigali, houses 249 men, 125 women, and 83 children, who were evacuated from squalid detention centres in Libya.

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Why is the ECB still fiddling over a potential eurozone crisis? | Nils Pratley

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Christine Lagarde is failing to heed the lesson of last decade’s crisis: act quickly and act clearly

Perhaps the European Central Bank was feeling left out as the financial world turned its attention to the US Federal Reserve’s interest rate hike. But emergency meetings of major central banks are supposed to produce more substance than the weak offering that emerged from Frankfurt after a morning of contemplation: a plan to accelerate work on a “new anti-fragmentation instrument”.

The fragmentation in question is the widening of bond yields between eurozone countries. In short, as interest rate rises have come into view, weaker economies are having to pay meaningfully greater rates to borrow than the likes of Germany – about 2.4 percentage points more in the case of Italy.

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Toronto police chief apologizes to people of color over disproportionate use of force

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Black people are 2.2 times more likely to have a police interaction and 1.6 times more likely to have force used on them, police statistics show

Black, indigenous and other racialized communities have faced disproportionate use-of-force and strip searches by Toronto police, chief James Ramer said on Wednesday, as he apologized and promised to address systemic racism in the department.

“As an organization we have not done enough to ensure that every person in our city receives fair and unbiased policing and for this, as chief of police and on behalf of the service, I am sorry and I apologize unreservedly,” Ramer said.

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Eighteenth-century cockroach found in slave-trading ship ledger

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Insect’s journey probably began in west Africa on vessel that sailed from La Rochelle in 1743 to Guinea

An 18th-century cockroach named Peri, discovered in the ledger of a French slave-trading vessel, has become a surprise addition to the National Archives after the book was opened for the first time in more than two centuries.

The insect’s journey began onboard the slave-trading vessel that sailed from La Rochelle in 1743 for the Guinea coast. The crew later boarded a different vessel in modern-day Haiti bound for France, taking the ledger with them. But that ship was seized by British privateers during the war of the Austrian succession and sent into Plymouth.

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Ukraine ignores Russian ultimatum to surrender Sievierodonetsk

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Fears grow over the hundreds of civilians believed to be sheltering in the city’s Azot chemical plant

Ukraine has ignored a Russian ultimatum to surrender the embattled eastern city of Sievierodonetsk, as fears grow over the hundreds of civilians trapped in the city’s Azot chemical factory.

Russia ordered Ukrainian forces a day earlier to stop “senseless resistance and lay down arms” from Wednesday morning, as Moscow controls 80% of Sievierodonetsk, a city that has become a focal point of Russia’s advances in the east of the country.

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Pakistanis told to drink less tea to help fight economic crisis

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Minister appeals for people to cut their consumption by one or two cups a day and save on imports

A minister in Pakistan’s newly elected government has been criticised after appealing to the nation to drink less tea to help save on imports amid a deepening economic crisis.

Pakistan is among the world’s top tea importers, and the brew is hugely popular among rich and poor. The typical Pakistani is believed to drink at least three cups a day on average.

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Saudi authorities seize rainbow toys in crackdown on homosexuality

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Pencil cases, skirts and hats among items targeted for ‘contradicting Islamic faith and public morals’

Saudi officials have been seizing rainbow-coloured toys and clothing from shops in the capital as part of a crackdown on homosexuality, state media has reported.

The kingdom opened to tourism in 2019 but, like other Gulf countries, it is frequently criticised for its human rights record, including its outlawing of homosexuality, a potential capital offence.

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How cannabis-fed chickens may help cut Thai farmers’ antibiotic use

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Scientists observed fewer cases of avian bronchitis and superior meat after chickens given cannabis

It all began when Ong-ard Panyachatiraksa, a farm owner in the north of Thailand who is licensed to grow medicinal cannabis, was wondering what to do with the many excess leaves he had amassed. He asked: could his brood of chickens benefit from the leftovers?

Academics at Chiang Mai University were also curious. Since last January they have studied 1,000 chickens at Ong-ard’s Pethlanna organic farm, in Lampang, to see how the animals responded when cannabis was mixed into their feed or water.

The results are promising and suggest that cannabis could help reduce farmers’ dependence on antibiotics, according to Chompunut Lumsangkul, an assistant professor at Chiang Mai University’s department of animal and aquatic sciences, who led the study.

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US to provide an additional $1bn in security assistance to Ukraine for its efforts in Donbas – 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

Dmitry Medvedev, a long-term ally of Vladimir Putin who is currently deputy chair of the Security Council of Russia, has posted this morning to Telegram a message which gives some insight into the current state of senior level Russian thinking about the situation in Ukraine.

In the message, Medvedev questions a Ukrainian request that it receive energy imports this winter with an option to delay payment for two years. Medvedev says:

Just a question. Who said that in two years Ukraine will even exist on the world map?

There is a lot of excitement. More and more people want to obtain citizenship of the Russian Federation. Residents of the Kherson region today are en masse in queues to submit documents for obtaining Russian citizenship just because Russia can protect, Russia can feed and provide socially for a person in the country, in which a person is the highest social value of the state.

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Samuel L Jackson criticises Oscars for sidelining Poitier and losing mystique

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The actor, who received an honorary Oscar this year, spoke out against the producers’ handling of the in memoriam section, as well as the choice of presenters

Samuel L Jackson has criticised this year’s Oscars ceremony for its handling of the death of pioneering actor Sidney Poitier, as well as their attempts to reach a wider demographic by expanding the pool of presenters.

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, Jackson said he was “still a little ticked that the greatest actor we had in Hollywood died and they gave him, what, 10 fucking seconds. No. It should have been a whole Sidney Poitier section.”

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‘Deep concern’ over fate of Dom Phillips in Brazil, says Boris Johnson

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Prime minister says UK government will provide any support needed after journalist’s disappearance in Amazon

Boris Johnson has said the UK government is “deeply concerned” about the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the British journalist Dom Phillips, after Theresa May called on the prime minister to make the case “a diplomatic priority”.

May raised Phillips’s case during prime minister’s questions, citing correspondence with Phillips’ niece Dominique Davis, one of her constituents. Johnson said the UK had offered to provide support to Brazilian search teams looking for Phillips and his travelling partner, Bruno Pereira, an Indigenous expert.

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Mayra Flores wins special election to turn Texas House seat Republican

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South Texas congressional district goes Republican for first time as party continues to make inroads among Latino voters

A south Texas congressional district will be represented by a Republican for the first time following a special election Tuesday. The election of Mayra Flores, who bested her Democrat competitor in a 51%-43% vote, comes as Republicans continue to make inroads among Latino voters in south Texas.

Flores, reportedly the first Latina Republican to serve Texas in Congress, is expected to face a more challenging race in November, however. Her victory was to replace Democrat Filemon Vela, who retired before his term ended – meaning she was elected to serve out the remainder.

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US announces plan to build silos on Ukraine border to export grain

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Joe Biden working with European governments to avert global crisis and help lower food prices

Temporary silos will be built along the Ukraine border, including in Poland, in an attempt to help export more grain from the country and avert a global food crisis, Joe Biden has announced.

The US president told a Philadelphia union convention on Tuesday that he was working with European governments on the plan “to help bring down food prices”.

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Italian woman admits killing ‘kidnapped’ four-year-old daughter

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Martina Patti claimed her child was taken by three men, before confessing a day later in Mascalucia

A woman in Sicily has been arrested after admitting killing her four-year-old daughter, having initially claimed the child was taken by hooded kidnappers for a ransom.

The body of Elena Del Pozzo was found in a field close to her home in Mascalucia, a town in the province of Catania, on Tuesday.

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River pushed off course as floods leave Yellowstone ‘dramatically changed’

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Heavy rain and rapid snowmelt caused a dramatic flood that may forever alter the human footprint on the national park’s terrain

The forces of fire and ice shaped Yellowstone national park over thousands of years. It took decades longer for humans to tame it enough for tourists to visit, often from the comfort of their cars.

In just days, heavy rain and rapid snowmelt caused a dramatic flood that may forever alter the human footprint on the park’s terrain and the communities that have grown around it.

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Sealed Back to the Future VHS tape sells for $75,000 at US auction

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Copy of film on now antiquated format was previously owned by actor Tom Wilson, who played Biff Tannen in movie series

A sealed VHS tape of the hit 1980s movie Back to the Future has sold for $75,000 in the first ever auction of the now antiquated video-playing format.

The auction, held by Texas-based Heritage Auctions, featured 260 sealed VHS tapes, most of which were first-edition copies of movies from the 70s and 1980s. The Hill reported that the price tag meant the tape was probably the most expensive ever sold.

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Markets brace for sharpest rise in US interest rates in almost 30 years

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Federal Reserve expected to increase cost of borrowing by 0.75 percentage points to curb rising inflation

The world’s financial markets are bracing themselves for the sharpest rise in US interest rates in almost 30 years, as America’s central bank takes action to halt rising inflation.

After days of frenzied investor speculation and signs of growing central bank anxiety, the Federal Reserve is expected to increase the official cost of borrowing by 0.75 percentage points for the first time since 1994.

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