‘What about our lives?’: emotions run high in frontline Ukrainian city over ceding land to Russia

Trump’s talk of ‘land swaps’ as a simple transaction belies grim reality of what it would mean for people in Zaporizhzhia

The city of Zaporizhzhia, an industrial hub in south-east Ukraine, is as good a place as any to grasp the stakes of freezing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine along its current frontlines, or of implementing a “land swap for peace” deal as envisioned by Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump.

Since Russian troops began rolling into Ukraine in February 2022, Zaporizhzhia, with its broad avenues and Stalin-era apartment blocks, has been a 30-minute drive from the frontline. It has been under near-constant attack from missiles and drones. On Sunday, a Russian guided air bomb hit a bus station, wounding 24 people – just another day of suffering in a city that has known many of them.

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Flash flood in Indian Kashmir leaves at least 56 dead and scores missing

People on popular pilgrimage route were washed away by flood waters triggered by cloudburst, officials say

At least 56 people have died and 80 are missing after a sudden rainstorm in Indian Kashmir, the second such disaster in the Himalayas in a little over a week.

The incident in the town of Chashoti, Kishtwar district, occurred at a stopover point on a pilgrimage route. Days earlier, a flood and mudslide engulfed a village in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand.

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Abortion drug could help reduce risk of breast cancer, group of medics says

Stigma around mifepristone is stopping studies, experts in reproductive health claim in Lancet opinion piece

A drug used in medical abortions could help prevent women at high risk of breast cancer from developing the disease, according to an international group of doctors and scientists.

However, “stigma” around mifepristone is stopping pharmaceutical companies from investigating its potential as a new treatment doctors could offer to reduce the risk of breast cancer, they say.

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Ex-guard at California women’s prison sentenced to 224 years for sexual abuse

Gregory Rodriguez convicted of more than 60 charges of abusing women in his custody over nearly a decade

A former California correctional officer convicted of dozens of sexual abuse charges at a women’s prison was sentenced to 224 years in prison on Thursday.

Gregory Rodriguez, 57, worked as a guard at the Central California women’s facility (CCWF), the state’s largest women’s prison, and was found guilty in January of over 60 charges of abusing nine women in his custody, including rape and battery.

Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organizations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html

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Israel appears set to approve highly controversial 3,400-home West Bank settlement

Finance minister Bezalel Smotrich has said he believes E1 plan will ‘bury the idea of a Palestinian state’

Israel appears set to give formal planning approval to a highly controversial settlement project for more than 3,400 new homes that has been frozen for decades and which critics say would split the occupied West Bank in half.

Strongly opposed by the international community, the so-called E1 plan would extend the existing Jewish settlement of Ma’ale Adumim towards Jerusalem, further cutting occupied east Jerusalem from the West Bank, and further separating the north and south of the territory.

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Blackwater founder Erik Prince to send hundreds of fighters to strife-torn Haiti

Critics say Vectus Global’s presence – including snipers – will undermine Haiti’s police and UN security force

Hundreds of combatants from the US, Europe and El Salvador will reportedly be deployed to Haiti in the coming weeks to battle the country’s gangs as part of a mission led by the controversial Blackwater founder and Donald Trump backer Erik Prince.

According to Reuters, Prince’s new security firm, Vectus Global – which has been operating in the violence-ravaged Caribbean country since March – is preparing to intensify its activities there to help authorities win key roads and territories back from heavily armed criminal groups.

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FBI returns stolen document signed by conquistador Hernán Cortés to Mexico

US officials did not say who had the 16th-century page that was missing from Mexico’s archives for decades

Nearly five centuries after Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés signed it and decades after someone swiped it from national archives, a priceless manuscript page has been returned by the FBI to Mexico.

The document contains a detailed accounting of the logistics related to Cortés’s journey to what eventually became New Spain – a territory that stretched from Central America to modern-day Washington state.

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Ice deported boy with cancer and two other US citizen children to Honduras, suit alleges

Suit filed in Louisiana says agency didn’t give parents choice as to whether children should be deported with them

A lawsuit filed in Louisiana on behalf of two mothers and their four minor children, including one with cancer, claims the two families were unlawfully denied due process and deported by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) to Honduras in April 2025.

The lawsuit, which names the attorney general, Pam Bondi, Department of Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, and various Ice officials as defendants, alleges Ice violated its own policies, and multiple federal laws, when officers secretly detained the families, denied access to counsel and swiftly deported them to Honduras, ignoring legal filings.

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Dozens injured in Serbia as protesters clash with pro-government supporters

Second night of street violence in several cities after months of anti-government demonstrations boil over

Clashes between rival groups of protesters in Serbia left dozens injured overnight, police said on Thursday, as months of anti-government demonstrations boiled over into street violence for a second night.

A wave of anti-corruption protests has gripped Serbia since November, when the collapse of the Novi Sad railway station roof killed 16 people, a tragedy widely blamed on entrenched corruption.

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Ancient manuscripts return to Timbuktu 13 years after jihadist takeover

Malian city welcomes return of hundreds of crates of treasures after more than a decade stored in capital Bamako

Political and religious figures in Malian city of Timbuktu have welcomed the return of ancient manuscripts that were removed to the capital, Bamako, more than a decade ago to prevent them from falling into the hands of militants linked to al-Qaida.

According to a UN expert mission, jihadists destroyed more than 4,000 manuscripts and as many as nine mausoleums after occupying the desert city in 2012. Workers at the state-run Ahmed Baba Institute used rice sacks to smuggle the remaining documents out of the city a number of ways, including by donkey cart and motorcycle.

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Aid groups say Israel’s new registration rules are ‘weaponising aid’

Lifesaving goods for starved people in Gaza blocked by vague rules on anti-Israeli activity, say humanitarian bodies

More than 100 aid organisations working in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank have accused Israel of dangerously “weaponising aid” in its application of new rules for registering groups involved in delivering humanitarian assistance.

The letter represents the latest broadside from the international aid community against Israel after the EU, Britain and Japan on Tuesday called for urgent action to stop “famine” spreading in the Gaza Strip.

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Sudan cholera outbreak kills 40 in a week as health centres overwhelmed

MSF charity calls situation ‘beyond urgent’ as thousands seeking refuge from war rely on contaminated water

The “worst cholera outbreak in years” has killed at least 40 people in the last week in Sudan, according to the medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières.

Overwhelmed medical centres are resorting to treating patients on mattresses on the floor, MSF said, as the country’s two-year civil war aids the spread of the disease.

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Sheinbaum’s expulsion of criminals is more about placating Trump than keeping Mexico safe

Perhaps not coincidentally, the timing of tariff discussions was closely followed by the transfer of wanted criminals

Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has denied that the transfer of 26 alleged cartel members to the United States was part of any kind of deal with Washington and was instead about her country’s own security priorities.

This week’s expulsion marked the second time Mexico had sent top criminals to the US this year: in February, Mexican authorities handed over 29 cartel members, including druglord Rafael Caro Quintero, who was responsible for the murder of a DEA agent in 1985. The latest transfers took place after US authorities vowed that prosecutors would not seek the death penalty in any of the cases.

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Argentina rocked as contaminated medical fentanyl kills up to 96 patients

Dozens of hospital patients treated with opioid for unrelated conditions suffered serious bacterial infections

As many as 96 people are now thought to have died in Argentina after being treated with medical-use fentanyl that was tainted with bacteria.

The official death toll stands at 87, and a judicial source has told the Buenos Aires Herald that nine further deaths are under investigation.

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Putin ready to make Ukraine deal, Trump says before Alaska summit

US president’s comment that Russian and Ukrainian leaders may have to ‘divvy’ things up likely to raise alarm

Donald Trump has said he believes Vladimir Putin is ready to make a deal on the war in Ukraine as the two leaders prepare for their summit in Alaska on Friday, but his suggestion the Russian leader and Volodymyr Zelenskyy could “divvy things up” may alarm some in Kyiv.

The US president, who left the White House on Friday at 7.30am, implied there was a 75% chance of the Alaska meeting succeeding, and that the threat of economic sanctions may have made Putin more willing to seek an end to the war. “HIGH STAKES!!!” he posted on Truth Social as his motorcade idled outside the White House shortly after sunrise in Washington.

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Israeli airstrikes on Tehran killed inmates in ‘apparent war crime’ – report

Human Rights Watch also finds that Iran abused survivors of June attack, which killed 80 people

Israeli airstrikes on Tehran’s Evin prison in June killed scores of detainees, visitors and staff in what Human Rights Watch (HRW) has called an “apparent war crime”. Iranian authorities have since subjected survivors to abuse, enforced disappearances and inhumane detention conditions, the rights group said.

HRW’s investigation, based on satellite imagery, videos and witness accounts, found the 23 June Israeli airstrikes destroyed visitation halls, prison wards, the central kitchen, the medical clinic and administrative offices. No evident military targets were identified in the facility, which held more than 1,500 prisoners at the time, many of whom had been jailed for peaceful activism.

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Man accused of throwing sandwich at US border agent charged with assault

Sean Dunn charged with assaulting federal officer over incident in Washington, which could result in a year in jail

A man accused of throwing a sandwich at a US Customs and Border Protection agent in Washington DC has been charged with assaulting a federal officer – a felony that could result in up to a year in jail and significant fines.

Captured in a now viral video, the man authorities have identified as Sean Charles Dunn, 37, could be seen yelling “Fascists!” and “Shame!” at a group of officers as they patrolled the district on Sunday night.

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Peru enacts amnesty for military and police accused of human rights abuses

Families of victims and advocacy groups condemn law that covers internal armed conflict from 1980 to 2000

Human rights groups and families of victims of Peru’s two-decade internal armed conflict have expressed outrage after the country’s government granted a blanket amnesty for all military and police officers accused of human rights crimes from 1980 to 2000.

The Peruvian president, Dina Boluarte, signed the amnesty – which was approved by the country’s congress last month – into law on Wednesday, to the applause of military top brass and ministers at Lima’s government palace.

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Lula says Trump would be put on trial in Brazil if January 6 riots took place there

Brazilian president’s comments come amid US attempts to pressure judges in coup trial against Trump ally Bolsonaro

The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has hit back at Donald Trump’s campaign against the South American country’s judiciary, claiming the US president would be put on trial in Brazil had the January 6 US Capitol attacks taken place there.

Trump has triggered what some experts call the greatest ever diplomatic rupture between the US and Brazil by slapping 50% tariffs on Brazilian imports and sanctioning a supreme court judge in an attempt to help his far-right ally, ex-president Jair Bolsonaro, avoid prison for allegedly trying to stage a coup after he lost the 2022 election to Lula.

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France acknowledges role in repression of Cameroon independence movements

Emmanuel Macron writes to Cameroonian president with findings of joint commission on country’s colonial past

France has acknowledged its role in decades of violent repression of independence movements in Cameroon, the latest stage in a slow process of reckoning with its brutal colonial past.

In a letter to the Cameroonian president, Paul Biya, dated 30 July, Emmanuel Macron said it was “up to me today to assume the role and responsibility of France in these events”.

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