Category Archives: World News

Mount Everest rescue under way after snowstorm traps nearly 1,000 people

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Hundreds of trekkers stranded by blizzard on eastern face of mountain in Tibet already guided to safety by rescuers

Rescue efforts are under way on Mount Everest after a snowstorm trapped nearly 1,000 people in campsites on the eastern side of the mountain, according to Chinese state media.

Hundreds of trekkers stranded by a blizzard near the eastern face of the mountain in Tibet were guided to safety by rescuers on Sunday, as unusually heavy precipitation including rain pummelled the Himalayas.

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Syria holds first elections since fall of Bashar al-Assad

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After more than a decade of civil war, committee members will choose transitional parliament

Syria is holding its first parliamentary elections since the fall of its longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad, in a tentative step towards democratic polls that have been criticised as biased in favour of the country’s interim leaders.

As the battle-ravaged country moves through its post-Assad political transition after more than a decade of civil war, members of local committees are beginning the significant milestone of selecting a transitional parliament.

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Andrej Babiš to hold talks with other Czech parties on forming government

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Billionaire faces tricky task trying to secure enough support to become PM after ANO wins elections without majority

Andrej Babiš has met the Czech president, Petr Pavel, and is to hold talks with other party leaders as the billionaire populist begins the tricky job of trying to form a stable government after his ANO (Yes) party won parliamentary elections, but failed to secure a majority.

Final results showed ANO won 34.5% of the vote, held on Friday and Saturday, translating to a provisional 80 seats in the 200-member parliament. The centre-right Spolu coalition of the outgoing prime minister, Petr Fiala, came second on 23.4%.

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Marco Rubio says Gaza war not yet over as Israel and Hamas prepare for talks

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Secretary of state says ‘we’ll know very quickly whether Hamas is serious or not’ about release of hostages from Gaza

The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, said on Sunday that the war in Gaza has not ended, despite Israel and Hamas both agreeing to aspects of Donald Trump’s plan for an end to the almost two-year conflict in Gaza.

“We will know very quickly whether Hamas is serious or not by how these technical talks go in terms of the logistics,” Rubio told NBC News’ Meet the Press about the release of hostages from Gaza.

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Georgia’s prime minister announces crackdown on dissent after Tbilisi protests

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Irakli Kobakhidze accused EU ambassador of supporting ‘attempt to overthrow constitutional order’

Georgia’s prime minister, Irakli Kobakhidze, has announced a sweeping crackdown on dissent, accusing demonstrators who tried to storm the presidential palace of aiming to topple his government and blaming the European Union for interference in his country.

Kobakhidze levelled his allegations a day after protesters attempted to breach the presidential palace as local elections were being held. They were stopped by riot police using pepper spray and water cannon.

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René Magritte’s ‘superstar of surrealism’ to go on sale in Paris

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La Magie Noire, bought by family of wartime resistance heroine 90 years ago, expected to fetch more than €7m

A painting by the surrealist artist René Magritte that has been held in a private collection for more than 90 years will go on sale later this month.

La Magie Noire was bought by the family of the second world war resistance heroine Suzanne Spaak, who were Magritte’s benefactors at a time when he was struggling financially and had failed to sell a single work for two years.

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Populist billionaire Andrej Babiš wins Czech parliamentary election

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With Babiš’s victory the Czech Republic looks set to join Hungary and Slovakia in refusing support for Ukraine

Populist billionaire Andrej Babiš has won the Czech parliamentary election in a political comeback that puts the country on a course away from supporting Ukraine and towards Hungary and Slovakia, which have taken a pro-Russian path.

With the votes from almost 98% of polling stations counted by the statistics office, Babiš’s ANO (YES) movement captured 35% of the vote followed by the pro-western coalition of the prime minister, Petr Fiala, with 23.0%. The coalition defeated Babiš in the 2021 election.

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US treasury considers special $1 Trump coin reading ‘fight, fight, fight’

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US treasurer says officials looking at drafts for country’s 250th anniversary featuring president with raised fist

To commemorate the 250th anniversary of the US’s independence, the treasury department is mulling production of a $1 coin displaying Donald Trump with a clenched first under an American flag and the words “fight, fight, fight”.

The words overtly reference what Trump said immediately after narrowly surviving an assassination attempt four months before he won a second presidency.

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Storm Amy: man dies in Ireland as fresh weather warning issued for UK

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Man dies in ‘weather-related incident’ in Co Donegal, while Met Office issues yellow wind warning for whole of UK

A man has died and a fresh weather warning covers the whole of the UK as Storm Amy continues to bring widespread disruption.

Irish police said the man died in a “weather-related” incident in the Letterkenny area of County Donegal, Ireland, shortly after 4.15pm on Friday.

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Person killed in drone attack as Ukraine accuses Russia of targeting passenger trains

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Two trains were hit in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, killing one and injuring about 30 others, officials say

Two Russian drones struck trains at a station in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, killing one person and injuring about 30 others, officials said on Saturday, with Ukraine’s foreign minister accusing Moscow of deliberately hitting passenger trains.

“A brutal Russian drone strike on the railway station in Shostka, Sumy region,” wrote the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, on Telegram, posting a video of a wrecked, burning passenger carriage and others with their windows blown out.

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Hegseth says four killed in US strike on alleged drug boat off Venezuelan coast

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Pentagon chief says strike – fourth by US military in recent weeks – targeted boat with ‘substantial amounts’ of drugs

The United States carried out a strike against an alleged drug-trafficking boat on Friday that killed four people, US defense secretary Pete Hegseth said, a day after the Trump administration told Congress it was entering a new “non-international armed conflict” with cartels.

The strike, which Hegseth said he directed on Donald Trump’s orders, appears to be at least the fourth in recent weeks. Hegseth gave few details about the boat or the evidence that it was carrying narcotics, other than saying the US had confirmed it was carrying drugs.

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Journalist Mario Guevara deported to El Salvador after 100 days in Ice custody

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Removal comes after Emmy-winning Salvadorian reporter was arrested while covering ‘No Kings Day’ protest

Journalist Mario Guevara’s imprisonment by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (Ice) ended with deportation to El Salvador on Friday, his family announced on social media.

Guevara has been a media mainstay in the Atlanta area for about 20 years, after fleeing El Salvador to escape leftwing militias in 2004. Though he has a work permit and two of his children are American citizens, he has operated under the “administrative closure” of deportation orders for much of that time.

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Czechs begin voting in election that could return populist to power

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Billionaire Andrej Babiš hands out doughnuts on first day of voting as polls predict his ANO party will win

Czechs have begun voting in an election likely to oust their centre-right government, with polls favouring the populist billionaire Andrej Babiš to return to power on pledges to raise wages and improve growth while reducing aid for Ukraine.

The change would boost Europe’s populist anti-immigration camp and could complicate consensus on climate policies in a country where no sitting government has won a second term since 1996.

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Fears Quebec Starbucks gang shooting could signal shift to brazen tactics

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Local media named victim as Charalambos Theologou, shot as groups vie for power after arrests of alleged mafia bosses

The brazen daylight killing of a prominent Quebec gang leader inside a suburban Starbucks in the outskirts of Montreal this week could signal a new, more chaotic and brash environment when it comes to organised crime, observers say.

The arrests of alleged senior, older members of Montreal’s mafia in June has potentially left a chasm – meaning newer, younger gangs are attempting to gain a foothold.

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Final boat of 42-strong pro-Palestinian flotilla intercepted by Israel

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Protest vessel intercepted in the early hours of Friday morning 42.5 nautical miles from the coast of Gaza

The last boat of the 42 vessels in the Gaza humanitarian flotillathat sought to breach Israel’s 16-year maritime blockade has been intercepted by Israeli forces.

A live stream from the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF) had late on Thursday evening shown the Polish-flagged sailing boat Marinette still “sailing strong towards Gaza” after the Israeli government claimed to have halted the flotilla carrying about 500 parliamentarians, lawyers and activists including Greta Thunberg.

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Sarah Mullally is named as first female archbishop of Canterbury

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No 10 announces decision although role will not legally be taken on until January, before an enthronement service

Sarah Mullally has been named as the first female leader of the Church of England as Downing Street announced the 106th archbishop of Canterbury nearly a year on from Justin Welby’s resignation over the handling of a safeguarding scandal.

This is the first time an archbishop of Canterbury has been chosen since the Church of England allowed women to become bishops in 2014.

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‘I use cannabis as medicine’: the US basketball player facing execution in Indonesia over $400 of gummies

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Unlike his fellow basketball player, Brittney Griner, Jarred Shaw has received scant attention after being arrested for a drugs offence overseas

When Jarred Shaw, an American basketball player in Indonesia, stepped down to the lobby in his apartment complex earlier this year to collect a package containing illegally imported cannabis gummies, he thought that the medicine to ease his Crohn’s disease had arrived.

It had – but so too had 10 undercover police officers. A video on social media shows Shaw, wearing a black T-shirt and shorts, shouting for help as the swarm of officers move to apprehend him.

The Indonesian National Police did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

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China remembers ‘guiding light’ Jane Goodall’s wildlife conservation work

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Tributes paid to late British primatologist whose institute trained thousands of Chinese on protecting animals

Jane Goodall has been remembered as a “guiding light” in China, with hundreds of millions of people paying tribute online to the conservationist who died this week, aged 91.

The British primatologist and founder of the Jane Goodall Institute was well known in China, and her research and findings were ubiquitous in Chinese educational materials, which listed her among “women of achievement” in text books.

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Russia persistently targeting British satellites, UK Space Command chief says

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Maj Gen Paul Tedman says Moscow trying to disrupt UK’s military activities on ‘weekly’ basis and closely monitoring space assets

Russia is attempting to jam UK military satellites on a regular basis, according to the head of the UK Space Command.

Speaking to the BBC, Maj Gen Paul Tedman said Russian forces were actively trying to disrupt UK-based military activities “weekly” and were closely monitoring the country’s space assets.

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Captain of oil tanker linked to Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’ to face trial in France

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Vladimir Putin denounces seizing of the vessel as an act of ‘piracy’ and warned it could provoke confrontation

The captain of an oil tanker that authorities in France have detained off the country’s Atlantic coast and that President Emmanuel Macron has linked to Russia will go on trial in February over the crew’s alleged refusal to cooperate, a French prosecutor has said.

Macron has alleged that the tanker belongs to Russia’s “shadow fleet” of ageing tankers of uncertain ownership that are avoiding western sanctions over Moscow’s war in Ukraine. He also did not rule out that it could have been involved in drone flights over Denmark as it was sailing last week off the coast of the Nordic country.

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