Category Archives: World News

Ukrainian drones hit St Petersburg oil terminal and nearby port

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St Petersburg governor reports no victims after ‘large-scale’ overnight attack that also hit Baltic port of Vysotsk

Ukraine launched a big overnight drone attack on St Petersburg and the surrounding area, hitting the city’s oil terminal and port infrastructure in the wider region.

The St Petersburg governor, Alexander Beglov, said the city had been subjected to a “large-scale” drone attack that had hit its oil terminal. He said there were no casualties and the aftermath of the attack had been dealt with.

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‘The situation is terrible’: aid workers on life in Sudanese city pummelled by drone strikes

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El Obeid becomes key battleground in war between Sudan’s armed forces and their paramilitary enemies, the RSF

Fatima has lost count of the number of drone attacks on the besieged city of El Obeid in Sudan, but said the attacks this past weekend were the most violent so far.

The drones hit schools and fuel stations, killing more than 20 people, including students, she said. “Over the past few months, seeing 40 or 45 drones is the norm. You can literally count them,” said the aid volunteer, whose name has been changed for fear of retribution.

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German riot police clash with protesters hoping to block far-right AfD conference

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Thousands of police deployed to Erfurt in central Germany as party holds conference on key Nazi date

Riot police have clashed with opponents of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party on the streets of Erfurt in Germany, where thousands met to block roads and prevent AfD delegates from attending the party’s biennial national conference to elect its leadership.

Police reported 20,000 protesters were demonstrating in the eastern city, where Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla are expected to be re-elected as the party’s co-leaders in the run-up to crucial regional elections in which AfD could win power at state-level for the first time.

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Trump launches America’s 250th birthday celebrations with partisan attack

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In a speech at Mount Rushmore, the US president claimed a resurgent ‘communist menace’ posed a severe threat to the country

Donald Trump has kicked off America’s 250th birthday weekend with an extraordinary partisan attack on the “communist menace” in America, framing its supporters as “the enemy of July 4th 1776”.

The US president spoke for half an hour on Friday night at Mount Rushmore in South Dakota, the latest stop on his tour celebrating the milestone anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence from Britain.

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Crowds gather as six-day funeral for former Iranian supreme leader begins

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Up to 30 million people expected to attend delayed events for Ali Khamenei, killed at start of war with US and Israel

Huge crowds have gathered at the funeral of the former Iranian supreme leader after the gates of the sprawling Grand Mosalla mosque in central Tehran let in thousands of mourners who had been waiting through the night to enter the grounds.

Iran is staging mass funeral processions for Ali Khamenei – whose ⁠37-year reign was brought ⁠to an ​end in February by the first airstrike of the war launched by the US and Israel. By 5.30am, the Tehran streets surrounding the mosque were already filling up as Iranians, some travelling for hours and many carrying flags or posters of Khamenei, made their way to an event designed to emphasise the country’s sense of loss at the killing of the supreme leader and desire for revenge. Emotions filled the air as the crowds chanted Death to America and Israel.

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Overseas education project for women and girls axed by UK after two years

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The programme, aimed at keeping 1m girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, withdrawn after aid cuts

A leading higher education programme, aimed at keeping 1 million girls in school across Africa, Asia and the Middle East, has been axed by the British government just two years after it was announced.

The scheme, Strengthening higher education for female empowerment (SHEFE), which was unveiled with some fanfare two years ago by the outgoing Conservative government, had a £45m budget to increase access to higher education for 1 million students worldwide. It has now had its tender withdrawn, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) said.

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Stars assemble in New York City amid preparations for Taylor Swift 4 July wedding

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Singer and fiance Travis Kelce have been coy but festivities are getting under way at Madison Square Garden

The streets of New York City and the first-class lounges of Heathrow and JFK airports were crawling on Friday with celebrities on their way to attend the wedding of the year.

Taylor Swift had kept fans guessing about whether it was her nuptials that had caused the closure of 11 streets in midtown Manhattan and the endless deliveries of flowers, food and decorations to the huge Madison Square Garden arena.

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Pope praises US history of welcoming migrants in implicit rebuke to Trump

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Pope Leo urges Americans to live up to ideals of Declaration of Independence in first key address to US

Pope Leo has used his first key address to his home country to praise the US history of ⁠welcoming migrants, urging Americans to live up to the ideals put forward in the ⁠Declaration of Independence.

In his latest implicit rebuke to Donald Trump, the first US leader of the Roman Catholic church said the word “America” had become ‌a “byword for freedom” across the world because of the way the country welcomed migrants.

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New pipeline in Canada to proceed after C$150bn pledged to ease BC and First Nations concerns

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Port expansion and protections for whales part of BC and Alberta plan to expand country’s presence overseas

The governments of Canada and the province of Alberta will move forward on a major new oil pipeline after the pair announced a plan to ease concerns of British Columbia and First Nations on the Pacific coast.

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, shuttled between British Columbia and Alberta on Thursday to announce more than C$150bn in new investments in both provinces, part of a broader project of reducing trade with the United States and expanding his country’s presence in overseas markets.

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Spain’s conservatives and far-right Vox increase ties with Andalucía coalition

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Deal including ‘national priority’ policy brings prospect closer of countrywide agreement between parties

The prospect of a national coalition between Spain’s conservative People’s party (PP) and the far-right Vox party has drawn closer still after the two groupings sealed another deal that will allow the PP to continue ruling the southern region of Andalucía.

The PP, which has governed the former socialist bastion for the past seven years, lost its absolute majority in May’s regional election, forcing it to look to Vox to help it stay in power in Spain’s most populous region.

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Ukrainian woman suspected of Monaco parcel bombing was ‘disguised as a man’

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Suspect seen in Germany after attack apparently targeting tycoon Vadym Iermolaiev

The main suspect in a Monaco bomb attack this week that seriously injured a Ukraine-born business tycoon and two of his family members is a Ukrainian woman living in Germany who disguised herself as a man, authorities have said.

Interpol, the international police organisation, on Friday issued a red notice for Anastasiia Berezovska, aged 39, describing her as German-speaking with dark hair and a tattoo, possibly of a snake, on her right arm from the shoulder to the elbow.

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Ali Khamenei’s six-day funeral expected to draw millions in Iran

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Country’s leadership vows to never surrender as memorial on grand scale aims to relay message of resistance to world

In the small hours of Friday the police roadblocks, stalls, posters and army vans were starting to appear across Tehran, as millions of Iranians prepared to attend the long-delayed six-day funeral ceremony for Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader for 36 turbulent years.

Khamenei was killed aged 86 in the opening salvo of the US-Israeli attack on the country in February, and the final farewell ceremony is intended to be an epic display of personal mourning, national power, resilience and social cohesion. By Thursday, knots of mourners carrying flags and blankets were already gathering along roads festooned with banners showing the red fist, the symbol of the funeral, alongside the slogan: “We must rise.” Many were heading to special hostels being set up across Tehran for the pilgrims. In Revolution Square a giant statue of a clenched fist was being installed.

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Spyware used against MEP investigating Pegasus abuses, report finds

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Researchers say Stelios Kouloglou’s device was compromised after he joined European parliamentary committee

NSO Group’s hacking software was repeatedly used against a member of the European parliament while he was conducting an investigation of spyware abuses in Europe, according to a new report.

Researchers at the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto said they could not attribute the attacks against Stelios Kouloglou to any particular government operator of Pegasus spyware. But their investigation found the attack against the Greek now-former MEP bore the hallmarks of a previous hacking campaign against exiled Russian and Belarusian journalists in Europe.

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‘Bigger than football’: Norway fans’ Viking row makes waves at World Cup

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From Times Square to the Norwegian parliament and even in fighter jet cockpits, the choreographed row is everywhere

The fans have done it, in their thousands, in the stadiums. The players have done it on the pitch. Pretty much anyone who was there did it in New York’s Times Square. Norwegian MPs did it in parliament.

Prince Sverre Magnus, third in line to the Norwegian throne, rowed in an Oslo subway carriage. Care home residents in their 90s rowed in rural Norway and Norwegian Royal Air Force pilots rowed in their F-35 fighter jets.

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‘Give him any award, and he’ll come running’: Narendra Modi racks up honours on overseas trips

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Indian prime minister has a habit of collecting awards on his travels, some as their first and only recipient

As Narendra Modi touched down in Seychelles over the weekend, the archipelago nation in the Indian Ocean swiftly bestowed one of its “highest” honours upon the Indian prime minister.

Modi beamed as he accepted the Guardian of the Blue Horizon award from Patrick Herminie, the Seychelles president, complete with a trophy and certificate.

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Lisa Nandy quits X over fears Musk-owned site pushes ‘abuse and misinformation’

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Culture secretary says her department will stop using platform, citing concerns over far-right content fuelling violence and division

The UK’s culture and media department will stop using X because the site “now favours abuse and misinformation over meaningful debate”, Lisa Nandy has announced.

The culture secretary’s department is the UK’s second to quit the Elon Musk-owned platform over increasing concerns about the way it highlights and prioritises often inaccurate far-right and racist content and is used to incite violence and division.

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Man accused of ordering Daphne Caruana Galizia murder paid hitmen’s legal fees, court hears

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Yorgen Fenech said to have spent €400,000 on fees for men convicted of car bombing that killed investigative journalist

A businessman accused of commissioning the murder of the Maltese journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia spent more than €400,000 (£343,000) on legal fees for the hitmen convicted of her killing, prosecutors claim.

Yorgen Fenech, the 44-year-old heir to one of Malta’s largest fortunes, arrived in court for the second day of his trial on Thursday in an unmarked armoured police vehicle. He is on house arrest having pledged a record bail estimated at €50m.

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‘Truly international’ network of drug-facilitated rape uncovered by UK crime agency

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NCA says offenders arrange to sexually assault and film victims via online networks with crimes often taking place in trusting relationships

Criminal investigators in the UK say they have uncovered a “truly international network” of organised drug-facilitated sexual assault in which victims are sedated before being raped and sexually assaulted.

The National Crime Agency [NCA] has said online networks, “many as yet unidentified by law enforcement”, were allowing offenders to arrange to rape and abuse victims or arrange for sexual assaults to be filmed.

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Outrage over ‘cruel’ Florida move to ban undocumented students from college

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Critics condemn decision by education board aligned with hard-right Ron DeSantis to block access to college system

Immigration advocates in Florida have decried a “cruel and harmful” new rule by education officials aligned with hard-right Republican governor Ron DeSantis to ban undocumented students from state colleges and universities.

The Florida board of education voted on Tuesday to bar access to its 28 state-funded institutions to anybody not a US citizen or “lawfully present” in the country. It follows Florida’s move last year to strip discounted in-state tuition rates for certain immigrant students.

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Canadian boy dies of rabies after waking to find bat on his face

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Eleven-year-old developed symptoms 19 days after encounter in Ontario in ‘exceedingly rare’ case

Doctors in Canada say a child who awoke to find a bat resting on his nose and mouth while visiting an Ontario cottage later died of rabies, in an “exceedingly rare case” that highlights the need for better public awareness.

In a report published this week in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, infectious disease physicians confirmed that the 11-year-old boy died from rabies, a fatality they said probably could have been prevented with greater awareness of how the virus is transmitted.

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