Category Archives: World News

Hamas faces hard choice over next hostage release as ceasefire falters

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Delay will probably mean return to fighting, but releasing more hostages could force talks on next stage of ceasefire

Hamas is facing hard choices as the Israeli military bolsters troop numbers in and around the Gaza Strip and the three-week-old ceasefire falters.

The Palestinian militant group unexpectedly announced on Monday that it was postponing the next planned release of three Israeli hostages over the weekend, citing alleged Israeli violations of the truce: delaying the return of Palestinians to northern Gaza, blocking the arrival of aid and attacking civilians. It stressed, however, that it wants the ceasefire to continue, emphasising that mediators had five days before the handover to ensure Israel “complies and compensates for the past weeks”.

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Love rats: Canadians get chance to feed rodents named after old flames to owls

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Program is meant to help the endangered northern spotted owl – and it’s only C$5! – but rat lovers are not amused

Revenge, they say, is a dish best served cold. And for an endangered owl breeding program in Canada, it’s also a dish best served dead.

For the price of a coffee, spurned and disgruntled lovers can revel in the satisfaction of having a dead rat named after an ex, before it is fed to a northern spotted owl.

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Judge who granted Palestinian family asylum made wrong call, says Keir Starmer

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Family fleeing Gaza were allowed to join brother in UK after applying through scheme meant for Ukrainian refugees

A judge who granted a Palestinian family the right to live in the UK after they applied through a scheme originally meant for Ukrainian refugees made the wrong decision, Keir Starmer has said.

A family of six seeking to flee Gaza were allowed to join their brother in the UK after an immigration judge ruled that the Home Office’s rejection of their application breached their human rights, it emerged on Tuesday.

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Talks to form far-right-led coalition government in Austria collapse

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Disagreements over key posts and issues like migration mean snap election is likely, with far-right Freedom party ahead in polls

Austria’s Freedom party (FPÖ) has ended coalition talks with the conservatives on forming the country’s first far-right-led government after disagreements over key posts and issues such as migration.

The FPÖ – which topped national polls for the first time in September – has been negotiating with the long-ruling conservative People’s party (ÖVP) since early January.

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US no longer ‘primarily focused’ on Europe’s security, says Pete Hegseth

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US defence secretary says Europe should lead in defending Ukraine and that restoring pre-2014 borders is unrealistic

Donald Trump’s newly appointed defence secretary told allies on his first international trip that the US was no longer “primarily focused” on European security and that Europe would have to take the lead in defending Ukraine.

Pete Hegseth, speaking to defence ministers at a lunchtime meeting in Brussels, said Europe had to provide “the overwhelming share” of future military aid to Kyiv – and recognise that restoring Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders was unrealistic.

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Russia will not exchange Ukrainian land to reclaim parts of Kursk, Kremlin says

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Putin’s spokesperson rejects Zelenskyy’s plan for transfer of Kyiv-held pockets of Kursk to help end war

The Kremlin has said that Russia will never consider exchanging occupied Ukrainian land for parts of its Kursk region, dismissing a proposal outlined by Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the Guardian.

Zelenskyy revealed in an hour-long interview earlier this week that he intended to propose a straightforward territorial exchange with Russia to facilitate an end to the war, including the transfer of Ukrainian-held pockets of Kursk.

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Flight costs from France to rise as government more than doubles air tax

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‘Solidarity tax’ to go up in move criticised as ‘irresponsible’ by Air France, as Ryanair threatens to cut flights in country

The cost of flights from France will rise next month when the government more than doubles its “solidarity tax” on tickets.

The French government has said the increases are fair on ecological and fiscal grounds but critics say it will hit France’s ability to compete globally.

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Philippines storm survivors join climate protest outside Shell HQ in London

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Greenpeace protest draws attention to worsening typhoons and demands accountability from major polluters

For two days and two nights, Ronalyn Carbonel and her four children clung to the roof of their home as a huge storm raged around them. With the wind battering her village of Rizal, about 10 miles east of Manila in the Philippines, and water swirling through the rooms below them, they had no choice but to wait, hoping that someone would come to rescue them and hundreds of their neighbours.

“We did not have shelter, we did not have food … we just had to wait for the government for two days,” Carbonel said. “It is not easy, no electricity, no light, we just wait for the sun to rise. The children were scared, we had never experienced anything like this.”

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Trump’s disdain for South American allies is China’s gain

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The US is targeting its own allies and its withdrawal from the region has left a power vacuum for China to fill in

While Donald Trump and his Colombian counterpart, Gustavo Petro, were engaged in a very public row over the deportation of migrants last month, China’s ambassador to Bogotá was enthusiastically tweeting that diplomatic relations between China and Colombia had reached their “best moment”.

After Petro refused to receive a plane from the US carrying handcuffed deported Colombians, Trump retaliated by doubling tariffs and revoking visas for Colombian government officials.

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Intense heatwave in southern Brazil forces schools to suspend return

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Record highs delay start of classes in Rio Grande do Sul, where floods linked to climate crisis left 180 dead last May

During historic floods last May that left more than 180 dead in Brazil’s southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul, the water rose to the ceiling of the Olindo Flores school in the city of São Leopoldo, destroying furniture, books and parts of its infrastructure.

When classes resumed more than a month later, its 500 students had to be relocated to another school for months.

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China tops list of countries trying to silence exiled dissidents over past decade, study shows

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Russia, Turkey and Egypt also among worst perpetrators of transnational repression around the globe

A quarter of the world’s countries have engaged in transnational repression – targeting political exiles abroad to silence dissent – in the past decade, new research reveals.

The Washington DC-based non-profit organisation Freedom House has documented 1,219 incidents carried out by 48 governments across 103 countries, from 2014 to 2024.

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Elon Musk appears with Trump and tries to claim ‘Doge’ team is transparent

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Key presidential ally, whose agency has operated in secrecy, also makes claim – without evidence – of fraud at USAid

Elon Musk claimed in the Oval Office on Tuesday that his so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) was providing maximum transparency as it bulldozed its way through the federal government, remarks contradicted by the reality of how he has operated in deep secrecy.

The appearance from Musk was the first time he had taken questions from the news media since his arrival in Washington, and he used his time standing next to Donald Trump at the Resolute Desk to defend the aggressive cost-cutting measures the Doge team has pursued.

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Trump reportedly fires watchdog who oversees USAid after damning report

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Paul Martin, an independent inspector general and Biden appointee, warned of drastic effects of shuttering USAid

Donald Trump reportedly fired the federal watchdog responsible for overseeing the US Agency for International Development (USAid) on Tuesday, one day after the independent inspector general issued a damning report detailing the impact of the president’s sudden dismantling of the agency.

Paul Martin, who was appointed by Joe Biden in December 2023, was dismissed in an email from Trent Morse, deputy director of the White House office of presidential personnel, seen by the Washington Post.

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Marc Fogel: Trump says another release to come as he greets US teacher freeed by Russia

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President claims release of Pennsylvania teacher Marc Fogel, held in Russia since 2021, could be an important part of ending the Ukraine war

A US teacher who has been held in Russia since 2021 has been greeted at the White House by Donald Trump, who claimed the release could be an “important part” of ending the Ukraine war and that another, unidentified person would be released on Wednesday.

Marc Fogel, who arrived in the US on a flight from Moscow on Tuesday, said: “I feel like the luckiest man on earth right now. I’m a middle-class school teacher who’s now in a dream world.”

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French investigators say ‘all hypotheses remain open’ in deaths of British couple

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Prosecutor confirms body of Dawn Searle was found semi-clothed outside with head injuries caused by several blows

French police say they are still investigating the deaths of a British couple whose bodies were found at their rural home in Aveyron in the south of France last week.

The bodies of Andrew Searle, a retired fraud investigator, and his wife, Dawn, a project manager, were discovered at about 12.30pm on Thursday at their home in the village of Les Pesquiès.

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Amid the ceasefire wrangling, how popular is Hamas in Gaza now?

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The group still projects a powerful presence but, after all the damage, it will need to divert blame if the truce collapses

Of the many factors that will determine the fate of the fragile ceasefire in Gaza, one of the most difficult to quantify and predict is the level of popular support for Hamas.

On Monday, Hamas threatened to delay the release of further Israeli hostages, accusing Israel of breaches of the ceasefire deal. The uncertainty, just over halfway into the ceasefire’s six-week first phase, complicates talks on the far more difficult second phase. It also jeopardises the pause in the devastating fighting and the increase in humanitarian aid for Gaza that the truce has made possible.

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Police in Sicily arrest almost 150 people in mafia crackdown

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More than 1,200 officers involved in dawn raids in and around Palermo, reportedly biggest operation against Cosa Nostra since 1984

Italian police have arrested almost 150 people in a significant operation against the Sicilian mafia in Palermo, areas of which remain in the grip of powerful Cosa Nostra clans.

Warrants were issued against a total of 183 people on Tuesday, 36 of whom were already in custody, for crimes including mafia-type criminal association, attempted murder, extortion, drug trafficking and illegal gambling, police said.

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Top Republican condemns Elon Musk for ‘supplication’ to China in new book

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Exclusive: Tom Cotton, Senate intelligence chair, risks angering key Trump ally with harsh words for ‘tech titans’

In a new book, the Arkansas senator Tom Cotton condemns Elon Musk for “chasing Chinese dollars” and having “shamefully supplicated China’s Communist rulers”, in order to advance his own interests as chief executive of companies including Tesla and SpaceX.

It’s an explosive charge from the Republican chair of the powerful Senate intelligence committee, given that Musk, the world’s richest person, is a major donor and close adviser to Donald Trump, now working at the heart of the president’s administration to slash costs and reshape the federal government.

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First Thing: Musk-led group bids $97.4bn for control of OpenAI

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OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the offer will not be accepted. Plus, $500m of food aid could spoil amid USAid cuts

Good morning.

Elon Musk leads a consortium of investors that on Monday submitted a bid of $97.4bn for “all assets” of the nonprofit that controls OpenAI, with Musk escalating his feud with OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman.

What did the bidders say? “If Sam Altman and the present OpenAI, Inc. board of directors are intent on becoming a fully for-profit corporation, it is vital that the charity be fairly compensated for what its leadership is taking away from it: control over the most transformative technology of our time,” said Marc Toberoff, the attorney representing the investors.

How did Altman respond? Altman posted on X: “no thank you but we will buy twitter for $9.74bn if you want.” Musk bought Twitter in 2022 for $44bn and renamed it X.

What are analysts saying now? “Now the election isn’t going to be about Trudeau,” said Éric Grenier, a political analyst at the Writ. “It will most likely be about the next four years – and who is best able to deal with Trump.”

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Trump’s mass deportation plans spark panic in the Caribbean amid fake news

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Nations try to reassure citizens as Trump threatens unprecedented crackdown but scale remains unclear

Nations across the Caribbean have been attempting to reassure their citizens at home and in the US after misinformation spread on social media channels caused widespread panic over Donald Trump’s plans for trade tariffs and mass deportations.

Alarming stories claiming that 5,000 Jamaicans had already been given final removal orders or that more than 1 million undocumented people were on federal enforcement lists, have caused concern across the region.

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