Seven senior officials responsible for ‘delivering lifesaving aid’ told to leave amid de facto blockade of food, medicine and fuel
The Ethiopian government has told seven senior UN officials to leave the country, accusing them of “meddling in internal affairs”.
A statement from the foreign ministry said the officials – who include staff from the UN humanitarian agency, the UN human rights office and the children’s agency, Unicef – must leave Ethiopia within 72 hours.
Continue reading...Warsaw defies critics to extend state of emergency as it seeks to portray migrants as dangerous
Concerns over Poland’s treatment of migrants stranded on its border with Belarus are mounting after Warsaw this week ignored domestic and international criticism to extend a state of emergency and sought to portray them as dangerous deviants.
The European commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, met the Polish interior minister, Mariusz Kamiński, in Warsaw on Thursday night but won no concessions on the bloc’s request for monitors from the EU’s Frontex border force to be allowed into the zone, despite growing fears for the migrants’ safety after the deaths of at least five people.
Continue reading...Figures on English schools come as infection levels remain high in UK; India measures in response to requirements imposed on Indians visiting UK
In England, NHS tests and scans are to be offered at football stadiums and shopping centres to help deal with the backlog caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The health service is launching 40 “one-stop shop” diagnostic centres across England, which will carry out a wide range of health checks after referrals from GPs.
Continue reading...François Vérove took his own life and mentioned crimes in suicide note after being called in for questioning
A retired police officer has been identified as the serial killer behind a spate of murders and rapes in and around Paris in the 1980s and 1990s, in which he used his police card, handcuffs and professional restraint techniques to stop young women and girls, but eluded capture for decades until he took his life this week.
In one of the biggest cold-case reviews in the history of the Paris police, investigators had been seeking DNA evidence to identify the notorious serial killer and rapist known as the “pockmarked man” who had avoided capture for 35 years.
Continue reading...If approved, Merck’s drug would be first simple oral medication shown to be effective against coronavirus
An antiviral pill was found to reduce hospitalisations and deaths by half in patients newly diagnosed with Covid-19, according to results announced on Friday.
If approved, the drug made by the US firm Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics would be the first simple oral medication shown to be effective against Covid-19, which would mark a crucial advance in the fight against the pandemic. Other drugs, such as remdesivir, have been shown to be effective if given early, but all currently approved treatments need to be given as injections or IV infusions.
Continue reading...Push will be performed in Boortmeerbeek, where Simon Gronowski fled to safety, nine days before his 90th birthday
The 90th birthday of Simon Gronowski, who at the age of 11 escaped a train destined for Auschwitz thanks to three Belgian resistance fighters, is being honoured with the staging of an opera inspired by his story near the rail tracks where he fled the Nazis eight decades ago.
Sitting alongside Gronowski during Sunday’s performance in Boortmeerbeek, a village north-east of Brussels, will be the sculptor Koenraad Tinel, whose elder brother was the Flemish SS guard who ordered him and his mother, Chana, on to the train on 19 April 1943. Chana did not escape from the transport and was killed in the gas chambers on arrival at the death camp.
Continue reading...Open letter by current and ex-staffers alleges ‘consistently inappropriate’ behaviour by Blue Origin leaders
A group of current and former employees at Blue Origin, the space flight company owned by the Amazon founder, Jeff Bezos, has accused the business of operating a work environment that is “rife with sexism” and prefers “breakneck speed” to safety.
An open letter written by Alexandra Abrams, the former head of employee communications at Blue Origin and 20 other current and former workers, says the company’s culture “reflects the worst of the world we live in now” and must change.
Continue reading...Virginia Raggi hasn’t solved waste issues while far-right candidate advocates restoring fascist salute
Elio Perugini can’t remember the last time he had a decent night’s sleep. “It’s a disaster, the noise just doesn’t stop,” he said. “I hardly sleep any more. The worst of it is on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.”
Sleepless nights have become the norm for many in Trastevere, a neighbourhood in central Rome once treasured for its charm and old-world feel, but now known for its rowdy nightlife, petty crime, piles of rubbish and graffiti-scarred walls.
Continue reading...Experts hope he is resting and building up blubber reserves before returning to Arctic to look for mate
When Wally the walrus disappeared after more than five months of appearances around the UK and Ireland, interspersed with visits to France and Spain, observers feared the worst.
But after about three weeks at sea he re-emerged in Iceland, looking skinnier but much closer to his Arctic home.
Continue reading...Marriage with non-royal Kei Komuro to take place against backdrop of scandal, tabloid intrusion and public disapproval
When they announced their unofficial engagement four years ago, they were cast as a perfect match: the young princess and the clean-cut trainee lawyer, for whom she was prepared to sacrifice her imperial status.
Now the sound of wedding bells is within earshot, after the Imperial Household Agency announced on Friday that Princess Mako, the niece of Japan’s emperor, would marry her non-royal fiance, Kei Komuro, on 26 October.
Continue reading...World’s second biggest economy is grappling with power cuts that have affected industrial output
China’s central government officials have ordered the top state-owned energy companies to secure fuel supplies for winter at all costs as the country battles a power crisis that threatens to hit growth in the world’s second biggest economy.
The vice-premier, Han Zheng, has told energy companies to make sure there is enough fuel to keep the country running and made it clear that Beijing would not tolerate blackouts, according to a report by Bloomberg.
Continue reading...People with the condition can face being seen as ‘cursed’ in the east African country, says Martin Senkubuge, whose art aims to make them proud of their skin
It was a confrontation with a female Michael Jackson fan that first drew Martin Senkubuge’s attention to the skin condition vitiligo.
Senkubuge, a Ugandan artist, was describing his tattoo of the musician to the woman at an art exhibition in Kampala in 2019, when he accused the pop star of bleaching his skin.
Continue reading...Some hospitals have experienced staff shortages after new rules went into effect – but the mandate appears to be working
Erie County Medical Center, a hospital in the western New York city of Buffalo, just recorded its highest single-day patient count ever – 553 patients in a facility licensed for 573 beds – but not because of an influx of Covid-19 cases.
Instead, hospital leaders said the caseload is the result of a New York state vaccine mandate – the first statewide “vaccinate or terminate” mandate to be implemented in the nation.
Continue reading...Women in refuges have been sent home to their abusers or to prison since the Taliban takeover. Those in the few shelters still open fear what lies ahead
Zari was seven years old when her parents died, forcing her to move in with her uncle. But when he died four years later, his two widows beat Zari and forced her to work long hours weaving carpets. During her teenage years, Zari tried to kill herself.
After her suicide attempt, Zari, now 28, moved into a shelter for abused women. For the past eight years she has held on to the belief that things would get better. She made friends and learned to sew clothes, eventually teaching others to do the same.
Continue reading...Exclusive: UN agency must respond to the ‘real needs’ of the women and girls, says Julienne Lusenge, co-chair of the independent inquiry into the scandal
Survivors of sexual abuse by World Health Organization aid workers during the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Ebola outbreak in 2018 should receive “substantive” reparations, the co-chair of an independent inquiry into the scandal has said.
Julienne Lusenge, a prominent Congolese human rights activist, said it was “essential” that the UN’s global health body drew up a workable plan for reparations to respond to the “real needs” of women and girls who became victims of abuse.
Continue reading...Bill passed by Senate and House will extend funding until 3 December as Democrats continue to wrangle over Biden’s economic agenda
House speaker Nancy Pelosi left her press conference by urging reporters to “think positively” about the negotiations over the infrastructure bill and the reconciliation package.
And yet, as Pelosi was making her comments, House majority leader Steny Hoyer said he was not confident that the infrastructure bill would pass today, as Democratic leadership had previously hoped.
Continue reading...Volcano on La Palma has been steadily spewing molten rock into the sea, enlarging the size of the island
Lava from the volcano in Spain’s Canary Islands that began cascading into the ocean two days ago has already covered an area bigger than 25 football pitches.
By late Thursday, the newly wrought peninsula on La Palma had doubled in size to 20 hectares (50 acres) since the morning, according to the Volcanic Institute of the Canaries (Involcan).
Continue reading...Mali’s military leaders under pressure to pull back from suspected agreement with Wagner Group
The UK has joined a mounting international campaign of pressure on Mali’s military leaders to step back from a suspected deal with a Russian mercenary company, amid fears that the agreement will further complicate insecurity in the region.
Mali’s leaders, battling a jihadist insurgency – and amid a fragile political transition following multiple coups – have been coy on details of a reported deal with the Wagner Group.
Yet Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, conceded last week that talks with Mali had occurred. “They have turned to a private military company from Russia,” he said at the UN general assembly last Saturday. “France wants to significantly draw down its military component which was present there.”
The developments have sparked international concerns, anger in France, and mixed reactions within Mali amid the worsening violence suffered in the country.
Congress passed a bill to fund the government into December. But questions remain over the debt ceiling and Biden’s agenda
The US government went into Thursday embroiled in a game of three-dimensional chess with time running out and trillions of dollars at stake.
The first dimension was a must-do: fund the government by midnight to avoid it shutting down. In a typical shutdown, hundreds of thousands of federal employees stop getting paid and many stop working; some services are suspended and numerous national attractions and national parks temporarily close.
Continue reading...SpaceX founder, who in April won a contract from Nasa, took a jab at Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin for suing when it lost out on deal
Elon Musk intensified the feud over lawsuits and rocket sizes with space rival Jeff Bezos this week, kicking off the latest round in the billionaire battle over humanity’s return to the moon.
The SpaceX founder, who in April won a contract from Nasa to build the next-generation spacecraft to take astronauts to the moon’s surface for the first time since 1972, took a jab at Bezos for suing the US government when his company lost out on the deal.
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