Category Archives: World News

Russian gas shutdown forces closure of almost all industry in Transnistria

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Pro-Russia Moldovan region suffers major hit after Ukraine ends transit agreement, with only food producers functioning

The shutdown of Russian gas supplies to Moldova’s breakaway Transnistria region has forced the closure of all industrial companies except food producers.

The mainly Russian-speaking territory of about 450,000 people, which split from Moldova in the 1990s as the Soviet Union collapsed, has suffered a painful and immediate hit from Wednesday’s cut-off of Russian gas supplies to central and eastern Europe via Ukraine.

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Italian fashion designer and ‘colour genius’ Rosita Missoni dies aged 93

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Founder of renowned knitwear brand was at forefront of bringing Italian ready-to-wear industry to global market

Rosita Missoni, the esteemed Italian fashion designer who co-founded the eponymous knitwear brand, has died aged 93.

Internationally admired for her colourful fashion house, which she established with her husband, Ottavio, in 1953, Missoni came to be regarded as fashion royalty for being one of a group of designers who brought the Italian ready-to-wear industry to a global market in the 1950s and 60s.

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‘Safe zone’ among areas targeted as Israeli airstrikes kill at least 43 in Gaza

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Director general of Gaza police among 11 reportedly killed in al-Mawasi encampment, designated a civilian safe zone

Israeli airstrikes killed at least 43 Palestinians across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, including 11 people in the sprawling al-Mawasi tent encampment designated as a humanitarian safe zone for civilians.

Among those killed in the al-Mawasi strike was the director general of Gaza’s police department, Mahmoud Salah, and his deputy, Hussam Shahwan, according to the Hamas-run Gaza interior ministry.

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Italy presses Iran for immediate release of journalist held in Tehran

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Foreign ministry summons ambassador as Cecilia Sala reportedly tells family she sleeps on floor of prison cell

Italy’s foreign ministry summoned the Iranian ambassador on Wednesday and urged the immediate release of an Italian journalist held in solitary confinement in Tehran.

Cecilia Sala, a 29-year-old freelance journalist for Il Foglio newspaper and a podcaster, reportedly spoke of the harsh conditions of her detainment in the notorious Evin prison, including having to sleep on the floor of her cell without a mattress.

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Removal of waste from site of 1984 Bhopal disaster dismissed as ‘farce’

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Indian government accused of PR stunt after moving 337 tonnes of toxic waste that had been held in containers

Forty years after one of world’s deadliest industrial disasters struck the Indian city of Bhopal, a cleanup operation has finally begun to remove hundreds of tonnes of toxic waste from the site.

However, local campaigners have accused the Indian government of greenwashing, arguing that the 337 tonnes of waste removed this week represents less than 1% of the more than 1m tonnes of hazardous materials left after the disaster and that the cleanup has done nothing to tackle chemical contamination of the area.

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Japan urges Australians to head off the beaten track as record numbers flood tourist hotspots

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About 807,800 Australians visited Japan between January and November last year, nearly 200,000 more than the previous record in 2019

Japan’s tourism board has urged holidaymakers to swap Tokyo and Kyoto for towns in Tohoku and Kanazawa as Australian tourists flood Japan’s cities in record numbers.

About 807,800 Australians visited Japan between January and November last year, nearly 200,000 more than the previous record in 2019, according to provisional estimates from the Japan National Tourism Organisation (JNTO).

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South Korea’s impeached president Yoon Suk Yeol vows to ‘fight until end’

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Letter rallying supporters comes as he faces arrest over declaration of martial law and allegations of insurrection

South Korea’s impeached president, Yoon Suk Yeol, has rallied his supporters in a letter saying he will “fight until the end” as he faces an attempt by authorities to arrest him over his short-lived declaration of martial law, a lawyer said.

“I am watching on YouTube live all the hard work you are doing,” Yoon wrote late on Wednesday to the hundreds of supporters who had gathered near his official residence to protest against the investigation into him.

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South Korea plane crash: police raid Muan airport and Jeju Air office

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Pressure builds on authorities to establish cause of crash which killed 179 people

Police in South Korea have raided Muan international airport, the scene of Sunday’s plane crash, in which 179 people died, as well as the office of the airline that operated the flight, media reports said.

Jeju Air flight 2216 was carrying 181 people from Thailand to South Korea when it issued a mayday call and belly-landed on the runaway, before crashing into a barrier and bursting into flames. Two flight attendants survived the crash, the worst aviation disaster on the country’s soil.

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Jocelyne Wildenstein, socialite known for extreme cat-like plastic surgery, dies at 84

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Known as ‘one of the jet set’s most outrageous characters’, Wildenstein died in Paris hotel aged 84

The Swiss socialite and cosmetic surgery aficionado Jocelyne Wildenstein, sometimes known as “Catwoman” due to her extensive plastic surgery, has died, her partner said on Wednesday.

“It is with heavy heart and with great sadness that Mr Lloyd Klein announces the unexpected death of his beloved fiancée and longtime companion, Jocelyne Wildenstein,” the fashion designer said in an English-language statement sent to the Agence France-Presse news agency.

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At least 12 killed and four wounded in Montenegro shooting

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Police identified the attacker as 45-year-old Aco Martinović, who they say opened fire in bar after a fight

At least 12 people, including two children, were killed and four others were wounded in a shooting on Wednesday that followed a bar brawl in a western Montenegrin city, officials said.

Police identified the attacker as Aco Martinović. The country’s interior minister, Danilo Šaranović, later told the state broadcaster RTCG that the 45-year-old died from injuries en route to hospital after shooting himself.

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Twenty missing after falling from boat in rough seas off Libya’s coast

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Small vessel tilted after taking in water, according to seven survivors who reached Italian island of Lampedusa

Twenty people are missing after falling into the sea from a tilting boat after it started to take in water in rough seas about 20 miles off the coast of Libya, according to survivors.

Carrying 27 passengers, the six-metre boat had left Zuwara in Libya at 10pm on Monday. Despite the waves, seven people managed to continue the journey on the rickety vessel before being found by an Italian police patrol boat on Tuesday night close to the southern island of Lampedusa.

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Russian gas flows to Europe via Ukraine cease as transit agreement expires

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Ukraine president hails ‘one of Moscow’s biggest defeats’ as deal’s end brings power cuts in breakaway Moldovan region

Russian gas has stopped flowing to Europe via Ukraine, ending a major energy route that goes back to Soviet times and had even survived three years of full-scale war between the two states.

Ukraine cut off the transit route after an agreement signed in 2019 expired in the early hours of New Year’s Day, marking a new milestone in Europe weaning itself off Russian gas supplies over the past few years, and prompting immediate power cuts for hundreds of thousand of people in a breakaway region of Moldova.

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Ukraine halts supply of Russian gas to Europe

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Ukraine ends agreement to allow gas to flow through its pipelines, with European supplies set to be tested as cold weather forecast later this week

Ukraine has halted Russian gas supplies to European customers through its pipeline network, almost three years into Moscow’s all-out invasion.

The move comes after a prewar transit deal expired during the final hours of 2024 and as the continent braces itself for a plunge in temperatures that could hasten the drain on gas reserves.

Ukraine’s energy minister, Herman Halushchenko, confirmed on Wednesday morning that Kyiv had stopped the transit “in the interest of national security” after Russia refused to alter its stance on the war.

“This is a historic event,” he said in an update on the Telegram messaging app. “Russia is losing markets and will incur financial losses. Europe has already decided to phase out Russian gas, and [this] aligns with what Ukraine has done today.”

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Israeli strikes kill at least 12 Palestinians in Gaza on New Year’s Day

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Officials say most of the victims were women and children as Israel’s war against Hamas continues into the new year

Israeli strikes killed at least 12 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on New Year’s Day, mostly women and children, officials said, as the nearly 15-month war ground on into the new year.

One strike hit a home in the Jabaliya area of northern Gaza, the most isolated and heavily destroyed part of the territory, where Israel has waged a major operation since early October. Gaza’s health ministry said seven people had been killed, including a woman and four children, and at least a dozen had been wounded.

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Critic wrongly jailed by former president of Philippines hopes to return to politics

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Leila de Lima enraged Rodrigo Duterte when she began investigating killings carried out during his ‘war on drugs’

Leila de Lima, one of fiercest critics of the former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte’s bloody “war on drugs” who was jailed for more than six years on baseless charges, will try to return to politics in 2025.

De Lima was one of the few politicians who criticised Duterte during his time in office, and enraged the former leader when she began investigating killings carried out during his anti-drugs crackdowns. She knew to expect retaliation, she said. “I thought it would just be regular vilification, the slut-shaming, the verbal attacks,” she said. She did not anticipate that she would spend more than six and a half years in prison.

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Trump’s killing of Qassem Suleimani led to fall of Assad, says Tugendhat

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Ex-security minister says assassination ordered by Trump set off chain of events that led to revolution in Syria

Donald Trump’s decision to sanction the assassination of an elite Iranian commander triggered a chain of events that has revealed Iran as a paper tiger and led to the overthrow of Basher al-Assad, a former UK security minister has said.

Tom Tugendhat, now on the Conservative backbenches and intending to focus on foreign policy, also predicted the Iranian regime would collapse in a few years. He said that if handled properly, Syria could become the economic powerhouse of the Middle East within a decade.

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Belgium becomes first EU country to ban sale of disposable vapes

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Products banned on health and environmental grounds, while Milan outlaws outdoor smoking

Belgium has become the EU first country to ban the sale of disposable vapes in an effort to stop young people from becoming addicted to nicotine and to protect the environment.

The sale of disposable electronic cigarettes is banned in Belgium on health and environmental grounds from 1 January. A ban on outdoor smoking in Milan came into force on the same day, as EU countries discuss tighter controls on tobacco.

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South Korea plane crash investigators extract data from Jeju Air black box

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Authorities hope for vital clues as contents of cockpit recorder are converted into audio format

Investigators in South Korea have extracted data from one of two black boxes retrieved from a Jeju Air plane that crashed shortly after landing on Sunday, killing all but two of the 181 people onboard.

The country’s deputy minister for civil aviation, Joo Jong-wan, said initial data had been retrieved from the Boeing 737-800’s cockpit voice recorder, and that the contents were being converted into audio format.

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Sweden begins wolf hunt as it aims to halve endangered animal’s population

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Five entire families can be killed, totalling 30 wolves, in move campaigners say is illegal under EU law

Sweden’s wolf hunt starts on Thursday, with the country aiming to halve the population of the endangered predator.

The Swedish government has given the green light for five entire wolf families, a total of 30 wolves, to be killed in a hunt campaigners say is illegal under EU law. Under the Berne convention, protected species cannot be caused to have their populations fall under a sustainable level.

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Top Venezuelan pianist urges music world to snub youth orchestra linked to Maduro

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Gabriela Montero asks promoters to cut ties with El Sistema on 2025 Europe tour, after alleged theft of election

One of Venezuela’s most celebrated musicians, the pianist Gabriela Montero, has called on concert halls and music promoters to cut ties with her country’s world-renowned youth orchestra as a result of Nicolás Maduro’s alleged theft of this year’s presidential election.

The Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela (SBSOV), which has close ties to Maduro’s administration, is scheduled to perform at some of Europe’s most prestigious classical music venues in January to mark the 50th anniversary of Venezuela’s world-famous music training programme, El Sistema.

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