Category Archives: World News

Hamas’s leader is dead, Iran vows revenge: can anything stop all-out war in the Middle East?

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The assassination of a Hamas leader in Tehran humiliated Iran’s leaders, dashed hopes of a ceasefire and left the heavily armed nations of the Middle East moving inexorably closer to an all-out war they all claim not to want

If Iran’s newly elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian, was hoping for a honeymoon period after his inauguration last week, he must be sadly disappointed. Less than 12 hours after Pezeshkian was sworn in, an explosion, reportedly caused by a remotely controlled bomb, shook an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) compound in central Tehran. The target: Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, an honoured guest at the inauguration, and one of the Middle East’s most wanted. The bomb under the bed killed Haniyeh instantly. Honeymoon over.

Pezeshkian was the surprise winner of last month’s presidential election. Edging out a conservative hardliner favoured by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, he promised to repair tattered ties with the US and Europe. Many hoped his victory would herald a more open, more progressive era and defuse social tensions, especially over the enforced wearing of the hijab, which triggered huge unrest under his predecessor, Ebrahim Raisi.

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Huge crowds return to Venezuela’s streets to protest against Maduro

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Tens of thousands gather in Caracas defying crackdown by president to hear speech by María Corina Machado

Huge crowds have gone back on to the streets of Venezuela’s cities to continue their campaign against President Nicolás Maduro’s alleged attempt to steal last week’s election and denounce his intensifying crackdown on opposition supporters.

Maduro said 2,000 people had been arrested and would face “maximum punishment”.

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Bullets and teargas reportedly fired at journalists covering protests in Nigeria

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At least 50 press arrested on Saturday in Abuja and almost 700 demonstrators detained since unrest began

Nigerian security forces on Saturday fired bullets and teargas at protesters and journalists during demonstrations against the country’s economic crisis in the capital city, Abuja, according to journalists at the scene and videos reviewed by the Associated Press news agency.

It was not immediately confirmed whether the projectiles fired at journalists were rubber or live rounds. But the AP witnessed the aftermath of the attack, including bullet holes in a car belonging to one of the journalists as well as live bullets at the scene of the protests.

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Iraq’s Yazidis gather to remember the dead and missing, 10 years on from Islamic State genocide

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A decade after thousands were killed or displaced, many in the remaining community are still living in refugee camps

Saturday marked exactly 10 years since Islamic State (IS) entered Iraq’s Sinjar province, displacing, killing and enslaving hundreds of thousands of Yazidis. On Saturday morning, crowds gathered for a ceremony to remember victims of the genocide at the “grave of the mothers”, where 111 elderly women were shot dead or buried alive after being separated from their family members.

The ceremony at the mass grave near the Yazidi genocide memorial in Solagh began at 10am, when a minute’s silence was observed across the country. Traditional Yazidi songs were sung, and poems and witness testimonies were recited on the stage.

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Zelenskiy praises Ukraine’s strikes on military targets inside Russia

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Ukrainian army reports several hits on sites including Russian airfields, oil refineries and logistics

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, praised his forces on Saturday for hitting military targets inside Russia, after his army reported several strikes including on an airfield and an oil depot.

“I would like to thank each of our soldiers and all those who work in our defence industry for striking Russian airfields, oil refineries and logistics,” he said in his daily statement.

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Why are Nigerians protesting? Young people were roused by events in Kenya

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A demonstration against the president about the cost of living crisis has spread, after youth groups saw protests across the continent force a change in the law

A protest organised by unions and youth groups about the cost of living crisis on Nigeria’s Democracy Day in June passed off quietly, drawing just a few hundred people in the country’s biggest city, Lagos, and the capital, Abuja.

Then things started to kick off in Kenya. Young Kenyans angry at the prospect of increased levies on essential foodstuffs occupied parliament in Nairobi amid violence that claimed more than 20 lives. Kenya’s president, William Ruto, was forced to withdraw his finance bill and dissolved his cabinet.

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Middle East crisis: Iran vows ‘severe’ revenge against Israel as US deploys jets and warships to region – as it happened

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Thousands of pro-Palestine protesters are marching through central London, UK.

Protesters waved banners reading “stop arming Israel”, “ceasefire now” and “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free”.

This terrorist operation was carried out by firing a short-range projectile with a warhead of about 7 kilograms - causing a strong explosion - from outside the accommodation area.

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At least 37 killed in terrorist attack on popular Mogadishu beach

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More than 200 wounded after suicide bomber and gunmen target busy beachfront in Somali capital

At least 37 people have been killed and more than 200 injured in a suicide bombing and gun attack at the popular Lido beach in the Somali capital of Mogadishu, police said. The attack happened on Friday night, when residents of the city typically gather at cafes near the seaside.

Agence France-Presse reported that police and witnesses said the bomber detonated his device late on Friday on the beach before gunmen stormed the area. State media said government forces “neutralised” the attackers after a gunfight.

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Assassination again shows Netanyahu’s disregard for US-Israel relations

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Hamas killing is further snub to Biden administration, which does not share methods or objectives of Israeli leader

Standing alongside Donald Trump in Florida a week ago, Benjamin Netanyahu was vague on the latest prospect of a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.

“I hope we are going to have a deal. Time will tell,” the Israeli prime minister said, two days after his controversial address to a joint session of the US Congress.

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Plea deal for accused 9/11 plotters revoked by Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin

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US secretary of defense pulls rank and withdraws agreements for trio accused of involvement in 2001 terror attacks

The US secretary of defense, Lloyd Austin, has revoked a plea deal for the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and two other defendants, reinstating them as death-penalty cases, according to a memo sent to Susan Escallier, who is overseeing the war court proceedings.

The short-lived deal came 16 years after prosecution of the three men began.

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Justin Timberlake appears by video and pleads not guilty in drunk-driving case

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Singer, 43, arrested in June, has license suspended in New York state as judge threatens attorney with gag order

Justin Timberlake made a virtual court appearance on Friday in his drunken driving case on Long Island, saying little during the brief proceeding as a judge accepted his not-guilty plea and suspended his right to drive in New York.

Police in the seaside village of Sag Harbor arrested Timberlake on 18 June after they say he ran a stop sign, veered out of his lane and got out of his BMW smelling of alcohol.

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Russian dissidents freed in prisoner swap speak of deal ‘dilemma’

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Activists say they never agreed to leave their homeland and vow to continue fighting for democracy in Russia

Russian dissidents freed as part of a prisoner swap between Moscow and the west have shared their mixed feelings about the deal and vowed to continue their political activity from abroad.

The exchange represented a “difficult dilemma”, said the Russian liberal opposition politician Ilya Yashin at an emotional press conference in Bonn.

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Russian prisoner swap deal was to have included Alexei Navalny

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Negotiations, which began months earlier, originally included release of late opposition leader

At Cologne airport on Thursday evening, a group of associates of the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny gathered waiting for a plane to arrive from Ankara. On board were 13 people who, until that morning, had been incarcerated in Russian prisons, including three people who had worked as Navalny’s regional coordinators in various Russian cities and been jailed for “extremism”.

After a swap in Turkey, they were now free, along with the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other Americans, who were heading back home on a separate plane.

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Weak US jobs growth for July sparks Wall Street sell-off

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US economy added 114,000 jobs in July in significant dip from June while unemployment increased to highest level since October 2021

The US labor market cooled significantly last month as unemployment unexpectedly rose, sparking fears of a slowdown across the world’s largest economy.

American employers added 114,000 jobs in July – short of the 180,000 additions expected by economists, and a marked decrease from the 179,000 added in June.

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Stephen Lawrence’s father says he was not told son’s body was being exhumed

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Neville Lawrence says he learned of plans to return remains to UK after he saw video of damaged grave in Jamaica

Stephen Lawrence’s father has said he was not informed of the decision to exhume his son’s body in Jamaica and return it to the UK, and that he is “appalled” at the condition his grave was left in.

It comes after Stephen’s mother, Doreen Lawrence, said her family had decided to “bring Stephen home to be closer to us” after originally burying him on the Caribbean island because they felt “he would not be at peace in this country”.

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Kremlin admits Vadim Krasikov is a Russian state assassin

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Spokesperson hints killer exchanged in prisoner swap was linked to Putin’s personal guard

The Kremlin has admitted that Vadim Krasikov, the assassin freed by Germany in a historic prisoner swap on Thursday, is a serving officer of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB), essentially an acknowledgment that his 2019 murder of a Chechen exile in Berlin was a state-ordered hit.

It also hinted that he was linked to Vladimir Putin’s personal guard.

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Russia-US prisoner swap: Kremlin confirms hitman Vadim Krasikov worked for FSB security service – as it happened

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Yesterday evening, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris met Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and two other freed American prisoners just hours after Washington and Moscow completed their largest prisoner exchange since the cold war.

Gershkovich spoke about his feelings boarding the bus with the other freed detainees on Thursday and said he was happy to see Russians on board as well.

He also said: “I spent a month in prison in Yekaterinburg where everyone I sat with was a political prisoner. Nobody knows them publicly, they have various political beliefs, they are not all connected with Navalny supporters, who everyone knows about. I would potentially like to see if we could do something about them as well.”

The Kremlin said that Vladimir Putin’s decision to meet released prisoners as they arrived by plane in Russia “was a tribute to people who serve their country and who after very difficult trials, and thanks to the hard work of many people, have been able to return to the Motherland.”

The Kremlin also confirmed that Vadim Krasikov, a hitman returned by Germany as part of yesterday’s major prisoner swap, was an employee of Russia’s FSB security service and had served in Alpha Group, the FSB’s special forces unit.

France urged Moscow to set free French citizen Laurent Vinatier and other people still “arbitrarily” detained.

Amnesty International has welcomed the release of people held in Russia but stressed that “this isn’t the end” and “Russia must free all persons jailed for peaceful dissent.”

For a few seconds, no one even noticed that Evan Gershkovich had taken his first steps back on US soil as a free man.

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Hamas leader buried in Doha as Biden says killing has ‘not helped’ ceasefire efforts

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Iran has vowed revenge for death of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, which came hours after killing of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr

Crowds gathered in Doha to bury the Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, assassinated in Tehran this week, as the US president, Joe Biden, said the killing had “not helped” efforts to broker a ceasefire in Gaza and warned he was concerned about escalating regional conflict.

Iran has vowed revenge for the humiliating attack in the heart of its capital, which came just hours after Israel killed the top military commander of Hezbollah in an airstrike on Beirut.

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Outbreak of Oropouche virus in Brazil should be a ‘wake-up call’, say experts

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The disease, spread by midges and mosquitoes, has been linked to two deaths as cases surge in previously unaffected areas

The deaths of two young women, miscarriages and birth defects in Brazil have been linked to Oropouche virus, a little-known disease spread by midges and mosquitoes.

A surge in cases has been recorded in the country this year – 7,284, up from 832 in 2023. Many have been recorded in areas that have not previously seen the virus.

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