Category Archives: World News

European leaders including Starmer to join Zelenskyy in Washington for meeting with Trump

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Emmanuel Macron, Friedrich Merz and others will aim to push back against ceding of Ukraine territory in ‘peace plan’

European leaders including Britain’s Keir Starmer will join Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, at a White House meeting on Monday with Donald Trump, in an extraordinary joint effort to push back on a US-backed plan that would allow Russia to take further Ukrainian territory.

As well as the UK prime minister, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, Italy’s PM, Giorgia Meloni, and the Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, will all accompany Zelenskyy in the Oval Office.

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Keir Starmer hopes to exploit curious relationship with Trump in Ukraine talks

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PM has positioned himself as someone who can get along with US president while stressing Europe’s red lines

Asked behind the scenes at June’s G7 summit if he could explain why Donald Trump seemed to like him so much, Keir Starmer admitted he did not really know. Whatever the reason, when it comes to Ukraine, the UK prime minister is once again hoping to exploit this somewhat curious relationship.

As soon as it was announced that a string of European leaders planned to join Volodymyr Zelenskyy to back the Ukrainian president in crucial talks with Trump at the White House on Monday, it was obvious Starmer would be joining them.

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Israeli media ‘completely ignored’ Gaza starvation – is that finally changing?

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A growing focus on hunger in Gaza in the global media has led some Israeli outlets to report on it for the first time

Images of Palestinian children in Gaza, emaciated by hunger under the blockade imposed by Israel, and of families grieving the more than 61,000 people killed in the territory have stirred outrage among foreign governments and much of the global public. Inside Israel, however, the reaction has been markedly different.

In a poll conducted in late July by the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI), more than three-quarters of Jewish Israelis – 79% – said they were either “not very troubled” or “not troubled at all” by reports of famine and suffering among Gaza’s Palestinian population.

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Putin demands full control of Donetsk and Luhansk as condition for ending Ukraine war – live

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Putin told Trump he would halt further advances and freeze Ukrainian frontline where Russian forces occupy significant areas, sources say

For those who feared the summit on Ukraine might resemble Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement of Adolf Hitler in 1938, the reality was worse.

The Guardian’s David Smith has this politics sketch from Anchorage:

Today, following a conversation with President Trump, we further coordinated positions with European leaders. The positions are clear. A real peace must be achieved, one that will be lasting, not just another pause between Russian invasions.

Killings must stop as soon as possible, the fire must cease both on the battlefield and in the sky, as well as against our port infrastructure. All Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians must be released, and the children abducted by Russia must be returned. Thousands of our people remain in captivity – they all must be brought home. Pressure on Russia must be maintained while the aggression and occupation continue.

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Cyprus welcomes resignation of UK trade envoy after visit to occupied north

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Afzal Khan had said visit to Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus was in personal capacity but resigned after furore

Cyprus has welcomed the resignation of the UK’s trade envoy to Turkey, Afzal Khan, saying it sends “a resounding message” amid widespread criticism of the Labour MP’s recent visit to the island’s breakaway Turkish-occupied north.

Khan had defended his trip on 8 August in a letter to the British prime minister, Keir Starmer, claiming it was conducted “in a personal capacity during the parliamentary recess”.

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Zelenskyy may be asked to cede land to Russia at Trump meeting in Washington

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Ukrainian leader to return to White House after Alaska summit between US president and Vladimir Putin

Ukraine’s president has said he will fly to Washington on Monday to meet Donald Trump after the Alaska summit amid speculation that the US president will ask him to cede territory to end the war.

Next week’s meeting will mark the first return to the White House for Volodymyr Zelenskyy since his infamous row with Trump and the vice-president, JD Vance, in the Oval Office in February.

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New Zealand woman and six-year-old son released from US detention

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Sarah Shaw was detained by Ice owing to a problem with her ‘combo card’ visa as she tried to re-enter the US from Canada

A New Zealand woman and her six-year-old son, who were held for more than three weeks at a US immigration centre after being detained crossing the Canada-US border, have been released.

In a short update on Saturday, the woman’s friend Victoria Besancon said Sarah Shaw and her son were safely home. The family would be taking some time to settle in before speaking about their experience, she added.

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‘It’s nearly come full circle’: Charlestown proud of Gallagher connection as Oasis come to Ireland

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Liam and Noel used to be taken for summer holidays with relatives in Mayo and kept returning after finding fame

Emigration ripped the heart out of Charlestown: generations of young people took the boat to England and left behind derelict homes and shuttered shops, a hollowing chronicled in a landmark 1968 book, The Death of an Irish Town.

Some returned to this corner of County Mayo for summer holidays – with children who were growing up with English accents and city ways – before vanishing back across the Irish Sea and leaving Charlestown to its decay.

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Tuvalu considers pulling out of Pacific leaders’ summit amid China-linked power struggle

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Exclusive: Prime minister Feletei Teo says Tuvalu may withdraw from crucial meeting after key countries such as Taiwan were barred from attending

Tuvalu’s prime minister Feletei Teo said his country may pull out of the region’s top political meeting next month, after host nation Solomon Islands moved to block all external partners – including China, US and Taiwan – from attending.

The Pacific Islands Forum leaders meeting will be held in Honiara in September. On 7 August, Solomon Islands prime minister Jeremiah Manele told parliament that no dialogue partners would be invited to the annual gathering.

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Men celebrate fourth anniversary of Taliban’s return to power in Afghanistan

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Thousands gather for Kabul ‘flower showers’ while women stage protests

Thousands of men gathered across Kabul on Friday to watch flowers being scattered from helicopters to mark the fourth anniversary of the Taliban’s return to power – a celebration that women were barred from attending.

Three of the six “flower shower” locations were already off-limits to women, who have been prohibited from entering parks and recreational areas since November 2022.

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Israeli unit tasked with smearing Gaza journalists as Hamas fighters – report

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Israeli-Palestinian magazine says IDF ‘legitimisation cell’ set up to blunt global outrage over killing of media staff

A special unit in Israel’s military was tasked with identifying reporters it could smear as undercover Hamas fighters, to target them and to blunt international outrage over the killing of media workers, the Israeli-Palestinian outlet +972 Magazine reports.

The “legitimisation cell” was set up after the 7 October 2023 Hamas attack to gather information that could bolster Israel’s image and shore up diplomatic and military support from key allies, the report said, citing three intelligence sources.

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‘Hellish’: heatwave brings hottest nights on record to the Middle East

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Temperatures did not drop below 36C in Sedom, Israel on Tuesday night, while several parts of Jordan stayed above 35C on Monday

Jordan and Israel have suffered through their hottest nights on record, with nocturnal temperatures in the Levant well above levels that scientists consider “hellish”.

Temperatures on Monday night did not go below 35C (95F) in Ghor es-Safi and Aqaba in Jordan, while in the capital, Amman, they stayed above 31.8C.

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Ukraine says it has bombed Russian ship carrying drone parts at Caspian port

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Attack on cargo vessel more than 500 miles from frontline is show of force before Trump-Putin meeting

Ukraine says it has conducted a long-range drone attack on a supply ship that it claims was carrying drone components from Iran, striking it at a port north of the Caspian Sea, in a show of force hours before Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin meet for a summit in Alaska.

Photographs showed a partially sunken cargo vessel at Olya, near Astrakhan, more than 500 miles from the frontline. Ukraine’s military claimed credit for the attack and the overnight bombing of an oil refinery at Samara on the Volga River, deep inside Russia.

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Far-right Israeli minister taunts jailed Palestinian leader in prison visit

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Itamar Ben-Gvir posts video footage showing him making threatening remarks to a gaunt Marwan Barghouti

Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has posted video footage in which he is seen taunting the imprisoned Palestinian leader Marwan Barghouti in jail, prompting strong condemnation from Barghouti’s family and Palestinian leaders.

The 13-second clip shows Ben-Gvir, a far-right politician on whom the UK and several other countries imposed sanctions this year for incitement to violence against Palestinians, making threatening remarks to Barghouti while Israel’s prisons minister, Kobi Yaakobi, an ally of Ben-Gvir stands nearby.

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African Union joins calls to end use of Mercator map that shrinks continent’s size

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Member states back Correct the Map campaign that urges governments and organisations to use more accurate map

The African Union has backed a campaign to end the use by governments and international organisations of the 16th-century Mercator map of the world in favour of one that more accurately displays Africa’s size.

Created by the cartographer Gerardus Mercator for navigation, the projection distorts continent sizes, enlarging areas near the poles like North America and Greenland while shrinking Africa and South America. “It might seem to be just a map, but in reality, it is not,” the African Union Commission deputy chair, Selma Malika Haddadi, told Reuters, saying the Mercator fostered a false impression that Africa was “marginal”, despite being the world’s second-largest continent by area, with more than 1 billion people. The union has 55 member states.

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Emmanuel Macron decries ‘antisemitic hatred’ after memorial tree cut down

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French president vows to punish those who felled tree planted in memory of Jewish man tortured to death in 2006

The felling of an olive tree planted in memory of a young French Jewish man tortured to death in 2006 caused outrage in France on Friday, with Emmanuel Macron promising to punish an act of “antisemitic hatred”.

Politicians across the political spectrum condemned the felling as an attack against the memory of Ilan Halimi, who was kidnapped by a gang of about 20 young people in January 2006 and tortured on a low-income housing estate in the southern Paris suburb of Bagneux.

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Mali’s junta arrests generals and French national over alleged coup plot

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Development comes as the military continues to crack down on dissent after a pro-democracy rally in May

Mali’s military rulers say they have arrested a group of military personnel and civilians, including two Malian generals and a suspected French agent, accusing them of attempting to destabilise the country.

The security minister, Gen Daouda Aly Mohammedine, who announced the arrests on the local evening news on Thursday, told viewers an investigation was under way and that the situation was “completely under control”.

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First Thing: Newsom says California hopes to redraw maps in response to Texas plan

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Republican redestricting move aims to win House majority in midterms. Plus, plastic pollution talks fail in Geneva

Good morning.

California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, has said lawmakers would proceed with a redistricting plan to counter the Republican-led map drawing effort in Texas aimed at securing a House majority after the midterm elections.

Will Newsom go ahead if Texas stands down? No. The California plan will only take place if Texas, or another Republican-led state, redraws its map in favor of the GOP.

What else do experts say about Bhattacharya’s “public trust” claims? That the issue is not whether the vaccines have public trust, but whether they are safe and effective, which they “clearly” are and this must be communicated.

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USSR sweatshirt and chicken kyiv: Russia dials up trolling before Alaska summit

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Foreign minister’s attire and inflight menu for Russian media are latest in series of provocations towards Ukraine

In a not-so-subtle act of trolling, Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, arrived in Alaska on the eve of the US–Russia summit wearing a sweatshirt emblazoned with “USSR”.

Once seen in western capitals as a pragmatic and skilled diplomat, the 75-year-old has in recent years mirrored the Kremlin’s radicalised politics, adopting an increasingly combative tone and resorting to trolling and mockery.

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Online fashion retailer Shein’s UK sales leap by a third to more than £2bn

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Profits rise 56% to £38.2m in 2024 as company overtakes British rival Boohoo and closes in on Asos

Shein, the online fast-fashion retailer founded in China, increased sales in the UK by about a third to more than £2bn last year, overtaking the British rival Boohoo and closing in on Asos.

The company, which had been considering a £50bn float on the London Stock Exchange but is expected to list in Hong Kong, said profits rose 56% to £38.2m last year on which it paid £9.6m corporation tax, according to accounts filed at Companies House this week.

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