Category Archives: World News

Shop fridges and freezers across Europe hit by fresh suspected cyber-attack

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Chains in seven countries say cooling unit temperatures rose overnight in incident similar to hack of French shops

Supermarket chains in at least seven European countries have said the temperatures of refrigerators and freezers in some of their shops soared overnight to as high as 50C (122F), echoing a cyber-attack last month that caused millions of euros of damage in France.

Retailers in Belgium, Estonia, Ireland, Finland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Sweden reported problems with their refrigeration systems on Monday, and several companies confirmed they had been hacked.

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Ryanair faces clash with unions as it mulls pay freezes amid soaring fuel costs

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Airline also weighs up reducing crew on flights and increasing use of AI as part of cost-cutting measures

Ryanair has said it is considering implementing pay freezes, setting the scene for a confrontation with unions as the airline tries to offset soaring fuel costs driven by the Middle East conflict.

The airline is also considering reducing crew numbers on flights and increasing the use of AI, in a cost-cutting drive.

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Hackers send fake nuclear threat alert to Ukraine emergency app

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Residents in Kyiv also warned of chemical attack and street-to-street fighting in false message sent by unknown party

Unknown hackers have targeted Ukraine’s nationwide emergency alert mobile app, sending residents in Kyiv a warning that they were at risk of an imminent nuclear strike.

The app reported a high possibility of nuclear radiation late on Sunday. It also wrongly warned of a chemical threat to the Ukrainian capital and street-to-street fighting. The messages were written in English with spelling mistakes, as well as in Ukrainian.

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Most Israelis think settlements policy should change to avoid more sanctions, poll finds

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Survey finds UK government’s decision to impose trade ban was not a decisive factor in how Israelis voted in election

The UK government’s decision to impose a ban on trade in goods from illegal settlements was not decisive in how Israelis voted in their general election, but a majority think the Israeli government’s settlements policy should change if it is going to lead to further sanctions, a new poll of Israelis shows.

There had been fierce criticism of the UK foreign secretary Ed Miliband’s decision in September to impose a trade ban and wider sanctions on illegal settlements, with some claiming it would drive Israeli voters into the arms of Benjamin Netanyahu.

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Tributes paid to ‘inspiring’ Cambridge scientist who died in Spain train crash

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Dr Marta Shahbazi was travelling to a conference to receive award for scientific excellence in developmental biology

An “inspiring” University of Cambridge scientist died in the Spanish train collision on Wednesday that killed at least 69 people.

Dr Marta Shahbazi, 41, an affiliate associate professor at the Cambridge Stem Cell Institute and a group leader at the city’s Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology (LMB), was travelling on one of the trains involved in the crash near Urda in Toledo province.

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Negotiators ‘braced for worst’ over US-Iran talks to reopen strait of Hormuz

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Third day of indirect talks as Qatar tries to negotiate release of $6bn in Iranian assets that could lead to waterway’s reopening

Officials from the Gulf states are “braced for the worst” as they wait for Washington’s response to an Iranian proposal that could reopen the strait of Hormuz before the US midterm elections on Tuesday.

Indirect talks in Doha ran into a third day on Sunday with Qatar trying to negotiate the release of more than $6bn in Iranian assets, which could lead to the reopening of the strait of Hormuz and the restart of negotiations on Iran’s nuclear programme.

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Ukraine defies Trump to resume attacks on Russian oil refineries

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Kremlin says Kyiv is ‘simply ignoring’ US wishes days before midterm elections after reported strikes on two oil sites

Ukraine has resumed its attacks on Russian oil refineries in defiance of pressure from Donald Trump ahead of the US midterm elections, as a ceasefire in the occupied town of Oleshky ended on Sunday night.

Russian state media said on Sunday Ukrainian long-range drones had set fire to the Kstovo refinery in Nizhny Novgorod oblast overnight, soon after a major strike against another big refinery in Samara oblast, owned by the Russian state energy giant Rosneft.

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Binance resumes customer withdrawals after record $6.3bn hack

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Cryptocurrency exchange says 90% of losses covered as FBI blames North Korean state-sponsored group TraderTraitor

The cryptocurrency exchange Binance has started to allow its customers to withdraw their funds from the platform, as it recovers from a record $6.3bn (£4.7bn) hack.

The exchange was hit by the theft on Thursday, which has since been described as the biggest heist in history, with experts identifying North Korea as the likely culprit.

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Britain should not issue apology over slave trade, says Kemi Badenoch

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Tory leader says apology would be ‘navel-gazing distraction’ and would be used as lever for financial compensation

Kemi Badenoch has said an apology for Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade would be a “navel-gazing distraction”, describing slavery as an evil “in which people from every continent and region participated”.

Speaking to broadcasters on Sunday, Badenoch also questioned whether it was worth future leaders attending the Commonwealth summit, given that it was now dominated by calls for reparations.

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Asylum seekers still being sent to France under ‘one in one out’ weeks after scheme ended

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Guardian understands Home Office continues to detain dozens of people, with one group forcibly removed this week

The Home Office is still putting asylum seekers on to planes to France weeks after the controversial scheme to remove them ended, the Guardian has learned.

The “one in, one out” scheme was announced by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and the former prime minister Keir Starmer in July 2025. It aimed to deter small boats crossing the Channel to the UK from northern France, with some asylum seekers arriving here forcibly returned to France while a similar number in northern France were brought legally to the UK.

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Tens of thousands protest against Narendra Modi regime in Delhi

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Led by Congress party, India’s opposition alliance channels anger over removal of 130 million names from voter roll

Thousands of opposition supporters have gathered in Delhi as protests against the Narendra Modi government continue to gather momentum.

Led by the Congress party, India’s opposition alliance has brought together supporters from across the country, amid growing anger over a large-scale revision of the country’s voter roll that has seen 130 million names erased.

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Oleshky evacuees reunite with families after truce allows crossing into Ukraine

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Residents of nearby villages line highway waving flags to greet the evacuees’ convoy from the Russian-occupied city

Evacuees from Russian-occupied Oleshky have been reunited with their families after crossing into Ukrainian-held territory on Saturday.

The major rescue operation began on Friday and was carried out under the most significant truce since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine four and a half years ago.

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Police clash with masked rioters after largely peaceful protests across France

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Demonstrations also taking place in Germany, where officers fire teargas to disperse crowds as evening falls

Clashes erupted in Paris, Marseille and other cities on Saturday after tens of thousands of demonstrators, some in Halloween fancy dress, marched across France in a third wave of protests over the cost of living and deteriorating public services.

The interior minister, Laurent Nuñez, said about 150 planned demonstrations around the country had passed off peacefully, but police had encountered an “extraordinary” level of violence from some rioters as the rallies ended.

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Canada and EU announce new alliance open to like-minded countries

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Alliance for the Future, unveiled at Montreal summit and open to other countries, conceived for world ‘shaken by new storms’

Canada and Europe have announced a new alliance of like-minded nations to serve as both a “protective canopy under which our citizens can thrive” and a powerful hedge against the unpredictable nature of geopolitics, while welcoming other countries to join.

Speaking to reporters on Friday from Montreal, the prime minister, Mark Carney, and the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, called the new partnership the Alliance for the Future and said the “deepest possible partnership between Canada and the 27-member bloc had the potential to offer unprecedented stability and opportunity”.

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How crypto hacking funds isolated North Korea’s nuclear programme

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Cryptocurrency theft is estimated to generate half of the country’s foreign currency income

North Korea plays by its own rules. The isolated, secretive and autocratic country is largely cut off from the world’s economic system – but when it comes to generating foreign earnings it relies on some of the world’s most sophisticated hacking.

Experts, such as TRM Labs, quickly attributed the extraordinary $6.3bn (£4.7bn) Binance cryptocurrency theft to TraderTraitor, an elite North Korean hacking unit that has also been known as the Lazarus Group. Though the link may not be proven yet, the pattern of behaviour is familiar.

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‘Amateur morons’: Flávio Bolsonaro’s short-lived ‘president-elect’ claim met with mockery

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Brazilian media ridicule defeated candidate over ‘shameful’ absconsion to US and bizarre letter with wrong coat of arms

Flávio Bolsonaro had hoped that by Sunday night people would be calling him the next president of Brazil.

Instead, the far-right politician’s decision to flee to the US after losing the election and – for 58 minutes – to declare himself “Brazil’s true president-elect”, has made him a laughing stock, with Brazilian newspapers and commentators raining a barrage of scornful adjectives down on the conquered candidate.

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Gulf states must rethink trillion-dollar defence in light of US-Iran war, says report

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IISS study questions overreliance on American support and ‘overdependence on expensive, high-end systems’

Gulf states are going to have to reconfigure their trillion-dollar defences given the damage inflicted on their economies and the questionable continued value of US bases in the face of Iranian attack, according to a study by the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

The report says that in the weeks before the 8 April ceasefire, 12 regional states, overwhelmingly in the Gulf, faced 4,670 Iranian one-way attack drones and more than 1,400 ballistic missiles. Nearly half were aimed at the United Arab Emirates. Although the vast majority were repelled, one estimate of the damage to energy infrastructure cited by the report is put as high as $58bn (£43bn).

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Beijing Queer film festival cancelled after harassment from authorities

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Forums for discussion of feminist and LGBTQ+ views face growing intolerance from Chinese state, say experts

Beijing’s annual independent queer film festival has been cancelled after what is understood to have been a campaign of sustained harassment from authorities.

Beijing Queer film festival, which was due to begin on Friday in China’s capital, is one of the country’s oldest independent film festivals.

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Russian society being ‘systematically crushed’ says Novaya Gazeta as newspaper announces closure

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Independent outlet, whose former editor Dmitry Muratov won Nobel prize, cites intolerable pressure from authorities

Novaya Gazeta, one of Russia’s best-known independent media outlets, has announced it will permanently close next month. The newspaper, whose former editor-in-chief Dmitry Muratov won the Nobel peace prize in 2021, cited intolerable pressure, including being stripped of its newsroom, its donation platforms and its legal right to publish.

“This is not just our own story; it is the story of a country and a society that are being systematically crushed,” wrote its editor-in-chief, Sergei Sokolov, on the newspaper’s website.

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Houthis sending Taiz ‘back to the stone age’, governor of besieged Yemen city says

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Oxygen, food and water supplies running low and massacres taking place, says Nabil Shamsan

The Houthis are trying to send the city of Taiz back to the stone age, the city’s governor said in a briefing designed to urge the international community to do more to lift the month-long siege.

Nabil Shamsan said massacres were taking place in Yemen’s third city, that oxygen and water supplies were running out and that rubbish was piling up in the streets due to landfill sites being either full or inaccessible.

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