Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Asylum seekers discharged from island holding centres are given little support to find accommodation and work
It never occurred to Sarah Husseini that one day she might think of Moria camp with something approaching affection. The 22-year-old Afghan spent two years in the infamous holding facility on Lesbos and, throughout, her young daughters were “sick, sick, sick”.
But then she, her husband Ali and their two toddlers were instructed to board a ferry to Piraeus and their world changed. “The UN told us ‘the government wants you to leave, you have papers now, you can’t stay here any more’,” she says, explaining why she has ended up semi-destitute in central Athens.
Beijing’s involvement in media overseas is growing almost faster than it can be tracked – the ultimate aim is both ideological and geopolitical
Kindergartens, handicrafts markets, high-tech companies, hydroelectric dams ... political indoctrination camps? These are some of the sights international journalists are whisked around when they take part in all-expenses paid tours to China. The motive of these invitations is, in the mantra of Chinese president Xi Jinping, to “tell a good China story” to the outside world.
In the past, that good China story would have been told through clumsy Communist party propaganda broadcast on its state-run news outlets. But during our research for the International Federation of Journalists, we found that Beijing is increasingly outsourcing the storytelling to foreign journalists, who often end up amplifying its messages in their own languages in the pages of their own news outlets.
Research into similar exercises in other countries has shown they lead to an exodus of talent and a loss of influence with key partners
Aid experts have warned of a brain drain of senior staff from the Department for International Development when it merges with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, which could damage the UK’s international standing.
Downing Street is facing growing anger from DfID staff over the timing of the merger announcement last week, and the manner in which it was done. The merger had been long trailed, but was announced without union consultation and with many staff finding out from the media.
Exclusive: International Federation of Journalists finds tours, control of infrastructure and provision of pro-China content part of escalating campaign
China is attempting to use journalists from non-English speaking countries to promote its policies beyond its borders in a concerted new push for influence, a report by the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has found.
A survey of journalist unions across 58 countries found that through study tours, control of media infrastructure, and the provision of pro-Beijing content, China is “running an extensive and sophisticated long-term outreach campaign … [in] a strategic, long-term effort to reshape the global news landscape with a China-friendly global narrative”.
Activists estimate at least 200 protesters are in Taiwan, where authorities have discreetly allowed them to stay by extending tourist visas
After fleeing to Taiwan from the frontlines of the Hong Kong protests, Ben suffered a recurrent nightmare for months: he dreamed his fellow protesters were being tortured by police, but he couldn’t help.
Ten months on from seeking refuge in Taiwan, his feeling of helplessness has eased and his fighting spirit has returned. He is among dozens of former Hongkongers who are finding ways to resist Beijing from Taiwan.
Speaking at his joint press conference with Polish President Andrzej Duda, Trump confirmed he would be drawing down the US troop presence in Germany.
The US president told reporters gathered in the Rose Garden that his administration would reduce troop numbers in Germany from 52,000 to 25,000 and would probably then send some of those troops to Poland.
"They'll be paying for the sending of additional troops" -- Trump announces that Poland has bought US troops that have been stationed in Germany pic.twitter.com/4DnhvNQrcv
Trump does Putin's bidding by blaming Obama and Joe Biden for Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2014 pic.twitter.com/MvYiK7W62Z
A grand jury has indicted three men on murder charges in connection to the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, who was fatally shot while jogging in a Georgia neighborhood.
Cobb district attorney Joyette M. Holmes announced that a Glynn county grand jury has indicted Travis McMichael, Greg McMichael and William R. Bryan on malice and felony murder charges in the February 23 death of Arbery.
Aaron Zelinsky says prosecutors were under pressure to go easy on Stone because of his relationship with the president
A federal prosecutor who was part of Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation told Congress on Wednesday Roger Stone, a close ally of Donald Trump, was given special treatment before sentencing because of his relationship with the US president.
As another religious painting restoration goes horribly wrong, we take a look at some of the finest examples of butchered statues, art installations and frescoes
In the latest instalment of the greatest genre of art news – and I write that as a lover of art – another restoration has gone awry. The word “awry” is being generous.
This is the revelation that a private collector, based in Valencia, paid €1,200 (£1,070) for a restoration job on baroque painter Bartolomé Esteban Murillo’s Immaculate Conception of Los Venerables. It is no longer immaculate. It now looks like an e-fit issued by a local police force, with those thin eyebrows popular in the 90s. What’s more, the restorer (who it turns out was a furniture restorer by trade) made two attempts – the second significantly worse than the first. That one, the e-fit one, has the Virgin Mary staring straight ahead, which isn’t even the same position as the original, which has Mary looking to the heavens.
World Health Organization director general Tedros Adhanom has said he expects the number of coronavirus cases around the world, now at approximately 9.3 million, to reach 10 million next week. Dr Mike Ryan, head of the WHO emergencies programme, said the pandemic for many countries in the Americas had not yet peaked, and that it was 'still intense', especially in Central and South America.
India has recorded its highest daily rise in new infections and the death toll in Latin America has passed 100,000 as countries from Croatia to Iran and Portugal to Bulgaria stepped up efforts to contain ongoing and fresh outbreaks of Covid-19.
Soldiers were called in to manage healthcare centres in Delhi after nearly 4,000 people in the Indian capital tested positive in 24 hours. Authorities have promised to make 20,000 extra beds available in temporary facilities run by army medics.
60-year-old was crossing from California to Hawaii
Madsen was also a campaigner for disability and LBGT rights
Angela Madsen, whose remarkable life took in a spell in the Marines, a string of gold medals and record setting rowing journeys, has died while attempting a solo journey from California to Hawaii.
The 60-year-old’s death was confirmed by her wife, Deb Madsen, in a Facebook post on Tuesday. “With extreme sadness,” she wrote, “I must announce that Angela Madsen will not complete her solo row to Hawaii.”
Residents and local businesses in a community in Germany’s most populous state that has been forced back into strict lockdown following a coronavirus outbreak at a local abattoir are demanding that those responsible are held to account.
North Rhine-Westphalia’s Gütersloh district, which has over 360,000 inhabitants, on Wednesday had its first full day under a reimposed coronavirus lockdown after more than 1,700 employees at the Tönnies abattoir and meat processing plant tested positive.
Court examining crimes during 1998-99 war also charges nine other former separatist fighters
A prosecutor investigating crimes committed during Kosovo‘s 1998-99 independence war with Serbia has indicted Kosovo’s president, Hashim Thaçi, for crimes against humanity and war crimes.
The indictment was announced as Thaçi was on his way to Washington for a White House meeting with Serbia’s president organised by Richard Grenell, Donald Trump’s controversial ambassador to Germany who was also appointed as the administration’s Balkan peace envoy.
Tauqir Sharif’s UK citizenship was revoked in 2017, after working on aid projects in the region
A British man living in rebel-held Syria has been abducted by the area’s dominant jihadist group, his family has said.
Tauqir Sharif and his wife, Racquell Hayden Best, from Walthamstow, east London, have been working on humanitarian projects in Syria since 2013 and are currently living with their five children in Idlib province, the last opposition bastion of the country. Idlib, in north-west Syria, has been controlled by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a militant group with links to al-Qaida, since January 2019.
Russia is holding its postponed Victory Day military parade despite rising coronavirus infections. The parade celebrates the defeat of Nazi Germany and has grown since Vladimir Putin came to power
Embassy in London claims construction project is covered by diplomatic immunity
A row over the construction of a wall at the Chinese consulate in Belfast has escalated after China said it would ignore a legal order to temporarily halt the work.
A letter from lawyers for the Chinese embassy in London to residents objecting to the security wall said diplomatic staff did not recognise the jurisdiction of courts in Northern Ireland.
As the coronavirus spreads, soaring demand for oxygen is bringing out a stark global truth: even the right to breathe depends on money. In much of the world, oxygen is expensive and hard to get a basic marker of inequality both between and within countries.
In wealthy Europe and North America, hospitals treat oxygen as a fundamental need, much like water or electricity. It is delivered in liquid form by tanker truck and piped directly to the beds of coronavirus patients. Running short is all but unthinkable for a resource that literally can be pulled from the air.
In Spain, as coronavirus deaths climbed, engineers laid 7 km (4 miles) of tubing in less than a week to give 1,500 beds in an impromptu hospital a direct supply of pure oxygen. Oxygen is also plentiful and brings the most profits in industrial use such as mining, aerospace, electronics and construction.
But in poor countries, from Peru to Bangladesh, it is in lethally short supply.
In Guinea, a west-coastal country in West Africa, oxygen is a costly challenge for government-funded medical facilities such as the Donka public hospital in the capital, Conakry.
A haunted house in Japan has developed a drive-through format amid the Coronavirus pandemic.
Inside a car, guests can scream as loudly as they like, with no mask required. And according to producer Kenta Iwana, 25, the new format might even be scarier than a traditional haunted house.
Kenya has lost 70% of its wildlife in 30 years, but conservancy schemes could halt the decline – and benefit local communities
Parsaloi Kupai’s home, situated on the edge of Ol Kinyei conservancy near the Maasai Mara game reserve, is no different from any other Maasai homestead – oval-shaped huts with an almost flat roof and walls plastered with a mixture of water, mud and cow dung. At the centre of the homestead is a cattle boma, an enclosure where his livestock spends the night, safe from the many predators that roam the area.
Kupai, 47, and his two wives chose to live here after they surrendered 69 hectares (170 acres) of land to the 7,500-hectare conservancy. He is among 240 landowners who gave up their highly valued grazing land for the project.
Tool in Yiwu comes after a rise in domestic violence during Covid-19 lockdowns and quarantine measures
The city of Yiwu in eastern China is set to begin a pilot programme that allows residents to check whether their partner has a history of domestic abuse before getting married.
According to a notice on the Yiwu government website, the city will on 1 July unveil a searchable database that includes the information of offenders from across the country, those who have been convicted, subjected to restraining orders or sentenced to detention over domestic violence since 2017.