Category Archives: World News

Battle lines redrawn in Spain’s snap election after latest train disaster

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Next month’s poll no longer the contest it was, as Pedro Sánchez finds himself forced to defend government’s safety record

One of the most dependable cliches of contemporary Spanish politics is that it never pays to bet against Pedro Sánchez. Time and time again – as leader of the Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE) and as prime minister – Sánchez has shown an almost preternatural ability to profit from adversity, and to confound expectations and wrongfoot his opponents.

But next month’s snap general election, called by Sánchez after rightwing and far-right parties voted down the housing reforms his coalition government had announced in response to angry protests, may suddenly not be the contest it once was.

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Sudanese diaspora and human rights groups denounce UAE nominee for UN top job

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Critics cite Lana Nusseibeh’s denial of accusations the UAE is fuelling Sudan war by supporting paramilitary RSF

Members of the Sudanese diaspora and international human rights monitors have denounced the candidature of an Emirati diplomat for the top job at the UN, citing her denial of accusations that the United Arab Emirates is fuelling the war in Sudan by supporting the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.

The UAE nominated Lana Nusseibeh last week to replace the UN secretary general, António Guterres, as he finishes his second five-year term ⁠this year, upending a race that had become gridlocked.

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DHS cites risk to more than 40,000 personnel in effort to take leaked data offline

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The Department of Homeland Security asked an Icelandic hosting company to take down data obtained through hack

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) asked ⁠an Icelandic hosting company on Thursday to take down or limit access to data related to thousands ⁠of agency personnel, saying ⁠the content ​put them at risk, according to the request posted online by hosting company FlokiNET.

The database “places more than ⁠40,000 identifiable individuals at risk of harassment, stalking and physical harm”, the request said.

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JD Vance letter may offer last chance to avert fresh conflict between US and Iran

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US vice-president writes to top Iranian security official in sign Washington has not abandoned diplomacy

Hopes of averting a major new conflagration between Iran and the US soon after Tuesday’s midterm elections could rest on Iran’s response to a personal letter from the US vice-president, JD Vance, offering to restart diplomacy.

The letter, written after predominantly Qatari mediation, was sent to the secretary of Iran’s supreme national security council, Mohsen Rezaei on Sunday. It requires Tehran to agree to make commitments on its nuclear programme at the start of a process that would lead to the opening of the strait of Hormuz within seven days in return for US sanctions relief.

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Seven oil tankers carrying 288,000 tonnes of Russian diesel sail towards US

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Tankers, tracked by Greenpeace, are first phase of Trump-Putin deal – but there is uncertainty over whether they will unload

Seven oil tankers carrying an estimated 288,000 tonnes of Russian diesel are now sailing towards the US, though it is uncertain if the vessels will be able to unload amid a political row about the legality of the shipments.

The transport, tracked by the pressure group Greenpeace, is the first phase of a contentious supply deal negotiated between presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin earlier this month, reversing years of sanctions on Russia oil.

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Hong Kong’s leader apologises for residential fire that killed 168 people

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Blaze was world’s deadliest residential fire since 1980, but some survivors and bereaved families say justice has yet to be served

Hong Kong’s leader has apologised for government shortcomings that contributed to a fire that killed 168 people in the city last year, a rare sign of public contrition that nevertheless failed to impress some victims’ families.

The chief executive, John Lee, and seven other officials bowed in apology at the release of a report that pointed to “decades of failure” by government bodies.

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Spain begins mourning period as search continues for train crash victims

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Emergency services, drones and dog unit continue to comb carriages as Civil Guard sets up clinics for relatives to provide DNA samples

Spain began three days of mourning on Thursday for at least 69 people who died in a high-speed rail collision, as hospitals continued to treat dozens of injured passengers and train drivers went on strike to urge more investment in railway safety.

The trains – one from Spain’s state-owned Renfe and the other from the private rail company Iryo – were travelling from Madrid towards the southern region of Andalucía on Wednesday when they collided just before 9am. After the Iryo train came to a halt, the other slammed into its rear, knocking several carriages off the track near Urda in the central region of Castilla-La Mancha.

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Cuts like a knife: Canadian rocker Bryan Adams trolls Trump with new song

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Musician wrote a ‘love letter’ to Canada with a new album – and some pointed commentary about the US president

Lake Ontario, the vast body of water that straddles the US-Canada border, has gone by many names over the centuries: Lac Saint-Louis, Lacus Ontarius, Skaniadorio, Cataraqui Lake. But one thing it will never be called, says the Canadian rock star Bryan Adams, is Lake America.

In his new song Lake Ontario, Adams takes aim at the US president, Donald Trump, accusing him of “breaking the peace” between the people who live on the lake’s shores.

The ‘lake of shining waters’ is what the Iroquois called her

It’s a First Nations name – not an executive order.

But things weren’t going his way in Iran

So like a baby tossing the toys from the pram

You can push us to the brink

But where the open road divides

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Brazil’s victory for the planet and democracy: seven lessons from Lula’s win

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The trouncing of the far right provides a playbook for social and environmental movements in other countries facing elections, including the US, Spain and France

Thank you, Brazil, for demonstrating how the far right can be trounced while protection for the Amazon is strengthened. In a world where nature and democracy appeared to be bleeding out in tandem, voters and forest defenders in this global south powerhouse have shown it is possible to staunch the flow. This should provide much needed inspiration and, more practically, a playbook for social and environmental movements in other countries facing elections, including the US, Spain and France.

The astonishing comeback victory of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Sunday’s presidential runoff against his extreme right challenger Flavío Bolsonaro has brought oceans of rapturous supporters on to the streets, while also thrilling conservationists, climate activists and social justice campaigners across the world.

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Netanyahu accused of smearing Arab voters to hold on to power

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Prime minister claims Arab Israeli parties used foreign backing to steal elections, in which his coalition lost its majority

Benjamin Netanyahu has been accused of using smear tactics to cling to power, after he claimed that Arab Israeli parties had used foreign backing to “steal” Tuesday’s election, in which the prime minister’s coalition lost its parliamentary majority.

Netanyahu and his allies called on the internal security service, Shin Bet, to investigate alleged vote buying and other irregularities in Palestinian communities in Israel, supposedly funded by foreign money.

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Elke Sommer, prolific German star of A Shot in the Dark and And Then There Were None, dies aged 85

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The Berlin-born performer had a gift for languages that took her to Hollywood, landing roles alongside Peter Sellers, Dick Van Dyke and Paul Newman

Elke Sommer, the prolific German star of the Pink Panther film A Shot in the Dark, early 70s Agatha Christie adaptation And Then there Were None, and British sex comedy Carry on Behind, has died aged 85. Bild magazine reported that Sommer died in Los Angeles of heart failure.

German-born Sommer, whose best-known film roles were in the 1960s and 70s, was one of the wave of European performers who crossed over to Hollywood and English-language cinema with considerable success, following the postwar emergence of European new wave cinema. Sommer was one of the few German actors to make waves at the time, as Hollywood made much of her bombshell image.

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Europe’s central bank chief, Christine Lagarde, steps down for ‘freedom of speech’

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Possible candidate to run World Economic Forum departs ECB nine months early, saying she wants to speak her mind about world affairs

Christine Lagarde, the eurozone’s top central banker, has said she is stepping down nine months early to speak her mind about world affairs and confront the “misrepresentation of the truth”.

Ending months of speculation about her future at the European Central Bank, Lagarde said she would quit her role as president in March rather than October next year because the rules of neutrality that governed her job prevented her from influencing debate about financial and economics affairs.

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Nvidia CEO reportedly targeted by an alleged Chinese spy

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Jensen Huang reported to have had close relationship with tech company executive suspected of passing intel to China

US intelligence agencies believe the Nvidia chief executive, Jensen Huang, has been targeted by an alleged Chinese spy who had done business with him, according to a new report by the New York Times.

Alice Huang or Huang Le, of no relation to the Nvidia CEO, is an executive at a Singapore-based datacenter company called Megaspeed. She had previously been suspected of smuggling Nvidia chips to China, prompting American officials to surveil and monitor her. Those officials have determined that she was acting as a Chinese intelligence asset, passing commercial information to Beijing, the New York Times reported, citing unnamed sources.

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Finland launches criminal investigation into Google’s clearing of forest for datacentre site

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Authorities allege company may have breached Finnish environmental laws by forgoing required impact assessment

Finnish ⁠police have launched a criminal investigation into possible breaches ⁠of the country’s environmental ⁠laws ​at the site of a planned Google datacentre in rural northern Finland.

Authorities allege that Tuike Finland, a Google subsidiary, cleared and drained 330 hectares (815 acres) of forest at the planned site in Muhos before environmental impact assessments required by Finnish law had been completed.

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Hello Kitty company cuts ties with Japanese spy show after China outcry

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Sanrio ends association with TV drama Vivant after China says portrayal of ruthless Chinese agents is ‘deliberate smear’

The company behind the successful Hello Kitty franchise has apologised and ended its commercial tie-up with a Japanese TV drama after Chinese state media and netizens condemned the show’s “deliberate smears” against China.

Sanrio, a Japanese firm whose characters are popular around the world, said in a post on the Chinese social media site Weibo that it had decided to end its association with the TV drama Vivant after concluding that it “contained elements inconsistent with Sanrio’s core values”.

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‘They mobilized a whole government response to that joke’: Obama laughs off Trump attacks in rally for Ossoff

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Former US president comes to Georgia to support Jon Ossoff for US Senate and Keisha Lance Bottoms for governor

Barack Obama, speaking at a Wednesday campaign rally in suburban Atlanta, offered a closing argument for Democrats in the final week of the midterm election campaign.

“These are not serious people,” he said of Donald Trump and the Republican party. “And we’re all paying the price for their lack of seriousness.”

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Utah files criminal charges against prediction market Kalshi and company co-founders

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Firm calls charges, which include violating state gambling ban and profiting from illegal activity, ‘crazy overreach’

Utah on Wednesday filed criminal charges against prediction market operator Kalshi and two of its executives, months after a federal judge rejected Kalshi’s effort to prevent Utah from enforcing its strict anti-gambling laws against the activity.

The felony charges could represent a new tactic in how states try to assert regulatory authority over the fast-expanding activity, a clash that appears headed to a showdown at the US supreme court.

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Judge rebuffs Trump DoJ’s bid to force California to set aside 20,000 ballots

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Justice department had demanded state segregate and not count ballots from people it claimed were non-citizens

A federal judge declined to order California election officials to segregate and not count ballots from people the Trump administration claimed were non-citizens, rebuffing a legally thin request from the justice department that appeared designed to cast doubt over the results of the midterms.

The ruling from US district judge David Carter, nominated to the federal bench by Bill Clinton, comes about two weeks after the justice department delivered a USB drive to election officials in Los Angeles and Sacramento that it said contained the names of 20,000 non-citizens on the state’s voter rolls. There are more than 23 million registered voters in California and non-citizen voting is extremely rare.

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New book makes fiery claims about Jared Kushner’s finances in Trump’s first term

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Kushner threatens to sue, denying allegations that two slush funds were set up to influence his Middle East role

A new book containing incendiary claims about Jared Kushner’s financial dealings during Donald Trump’s first term has ignited a political and media firestorm.

The book by author Matthew Cole is called Princes and Thieves: Jared Kushner and Mohamed bin Zayed’s Secret Plot to Remake the Middle East and was released in the US this week. An excerpt was published by Vanity Fair last Thursday, and immediately drew a furious response from Kushner, who called its claims “completely insane”. The book contains numerous allegations about Kushner, whose father-in-law is Trump and who has served as one of his top diplomatic envoys in the Middle East – the most explosive of which are claims linking him to huge bank accounts allegedly funded by Gulf states.

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US ambassador suggests Trump could blame Canada if midterms don’t go his way

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Pete Hoekstra, controversial US ambassador to Canada, has also accused Canadian officials of interfering in US elections

The US ambassador has suggested Canada could be blamed if Republicans perform poorly in next week’s midterm elections, the latest intervention from a controversial figure who has been accused of inflaming a bitter dispute that has angered and baffled residents of both countries.

On Wednesday, CTV news reported that Pete Hoekstra told business leaders at a closed door meeting that if a number of swing races – including Maine and Michigan – go to the Democrats, it could make things harder for Canada because Donald Trump might try to blame the loss on it.

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