Category Archives: World News

‘Like a war zone’: Chile wildfire death toll reaches 123 amid race to clear rubble

Posted on by

Death count for Chile’s worst natural disaster in years expected to climb as official two-day mourning period begins

Helicopters dumped tonnes of water on wildfires raging across central Chile, as emergency crews said they were still finding bodies three days after the blazes took hold.

The official death count from Chile’s worst natural disaster in years increased to 123 on Monday according to Marisol Prado, the director of Chile’s forensic medical service. That number was expected to climb as residents, firefighters and military raced to clear rubble.

Continue reading...

Lloyds and Santander accused of providing accounts for Iranian front companies

Posted on by

Both banks deny helping Tehran-controlled oil firm PCC to move money in breach of sanctions

Two of the UK’s largest lenders, Santander UK and Lloyds Banking Group, allegedly held bank accounts for front companies that helped Iranian entities evade US sanctions, according to reports.

The news has rattled investors, who sold off shares in the two banks on Monday morning, amid fears that the lenders could face penalties if they are found to have in any way assisted Iran’s state-controlled Petrochemical Commercial Company (PCC).

Continue reading...

Orbán boycotts parliament session called to ratify Swedish Nato bid

Posted on by

Hungary remains alone in holding up Stockholm’s accession despite PM’s promises not to be last to ratify

Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party has boycotted a session of parliament called by the opposition to ratify Sweden’s Nato membership, even as a group of western ambassadors arrived in the building to urge a vote.

For months, the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, repeatedly promised his counterparts within Nato that the country would not be last to sign off on Sweden’s membership.

Continue reading...

Middle East crisis: Drone strike in Syria reported to have killed six members of US-backed Kurdish-led group – as it happened

Posted on by

Six members of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have reportedly been killed at a base which also houses US forces

Emma Graham-Harrison and Quique Kierszenbaum report for the Guardian:

Shaadi Muqtasen’s family live in the centre of old Hebron, one of the most heavily contested, heavily militarised places in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. For Palestinian residents there, life all but stopped when Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October.

Continue reading...

Comments on Weibo giraffe post bemoan state of Chinese economy

Posted on by

Social media users get around government crackdown on negativity via US embassy conservation update

A social media post about giraffe conservation has become the latest place for people in China who are unhappy about the economy to vent their frustration, as the Chinese government increasingly cracks down on negative commentary.

On 2 February, the US embassy in China posted an update on its Weibo account about tracking giraffes in Namibia using GPS technology. As of Monday afternoon local time, the post had received approximately 166,000 comments, many of them about China’s economic pains.

Continue reading...

Nayib Bukele re-elected as El Salvador president in landslide win

Posted on by

Voters reward Bukele for gang crackdown that has transformed security in central American country

El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, has won a thumping victory in elections after voters cast aside concerns about erosion of democracy to reward him for a fierce gang crackdown that transformed security in the central American country.

Provisional results on Monday morning showed Bukele winning 83% support with just over 70% of the ballots counted. Bukele declared himself the winner before official results were announced, claiming to have attained more than 85% of the vote.

Continue reading...

Senegal riot police fire teargas to break up protests over postponed election

Posted on by

Mobile internet access has also been restricted, as parliament begins debate on bill to extend Macky Sall’s presidency

Riot police fired teargas to break up crowds trying to gather outside Senegal’s national assembly on Monday to protest against the president’s abrupt postponement of elections over the weekend.

As protesters shouted slogans, parliament began debating a bill that would reschedule the 25 February vote for 25 August and extend Macky Sall’s mandate as president until his successor is installed.

Continue reading...

Army looms large as Nawaz Sharif eases towards fourth term in Pakistan

Posted on by

Military has put its faith in former PM for fourth time, leading many to believe election outcome is already decided

With days to go before Pakistan goes to the polls, the feverish buzz and boisterous rallies that usually mark the campaign season have been unusually muted.

“There is a sense among many people that the outcome is already predetermined,” said Samina Yasmeen, a fellow from the Australian Institute of International Affairs.

Continue reading...

UN to investigate claims of corruption in Iraq aid project

Posted on by

Guardian report found staff allegedly sought bribes in return for helping people win deals as part of $1.5bn construction programme

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) is dispatching a team to Iraq to assess allegations of corruption in its $1.5bn (£1.2bn) construction programme following a Guardian investigation.

According to an internal document obtained by the Guardian, the UNDP’s administrator, Achim Steiner, has “commissioned a management review and assessment of the allegations” after revelations its staff were allegedly taking kickbacks in return for helping business people obtain lucrative construction contracts.

Continue reading...

We must act on Ethiopia food crisis, says UK minister

Posted on by

Andrew Mitchell warns of ‘humanitarian catastrophe’ triggered by El Niño-driven drought and conflict

The risk of a humanitarian catastrophe in northern Ethiopia is growing, Andrew Mitchell, the UK’s Africa minister, said on his return from a two-day trip to the region.

“We have an opportunity to stop a looming humanitarian catastrophe in its tracks. But we must act and act now,” Mitchell said on Monday.

The country is suffering from the impacts of long-term El Niño-driven drought and brutal conflict, including the two-year war in the northern region of Tigray that ended in November 2022.

Continue reading...

‘Deeply alarming’: sevenfold increase in sexual attacks at Darién Gap, says Médecins Sans Frontières

Posted on by

More than half a million people made treacherous, weeklong trek in 2023, facing horrors including mass rapes by armed bandits

A sevenfold increase in sexual attacks against people crossing the Darién Gap is compounding the misery for people trekking one of the world’s most dangerous and underreported border crossings, said Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF).

Complete impunity for armed gangs in the lawless stretch of jungle that links South and Central America meant one person became a victim of sexual violence every three and a half hours in December, the overstretched medical organisation said.

Continue reading...

Australian academic Yang Hengjun given suspended death sentence by Chinese court

Posted on by

Australia’s foreign minister says government is ‘appalled’ by sentence, which could mean life in prison

The Australian academic Yang Hengjun has been given a suspended death sentence by a Chinese court, after five years in detention on espionage charges. His sentence came on the same day that the women’s rights activist Li Qiaochu was sentenced to three years and eight months by a court in Shandong for “inciting subversion of state power”.

Yang was arrested in 2019 at Guangzhou airport, accused of spying for an undisclosed foreign country. The 57-year-old pro-democracy blogger is an Australian citizen who was born in China. He was tried in a one-day, closed-door hearing in Beijing in May 2021, with a verdict not publicly disclosed.

Continue reading...

Philippines says it is ready to use force to quell secession attempts as Duterte row deepens

Posted on by

Former president has called for his home town, Mindanao, to split from the Philippines as his alliance with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr crumbles

The Philippine government is ready to use “authority and forces” against attempts to divide the nation, a security official has said, after former president Rodrigo Duterte threatened to separate some southern islands from the rest of the archipelago.

Duterte has called for the independence of his home town, Mindanao, from the Philippines as his alliance with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr disintegrated this week over disagreements around efforts to amend the constitution.

Continue reading...

At least 112 dead as authorities struggle to contain forest fires in Chile

Posted on by

People told to evacuate homes as quickly as possible and curfews declared in cities most heavily affected

Firefighters are wrestling with huge forest fires that broke out in central Chile on Friday. Officials have extended curfews in cities most heavily affected by the blazes and said the death toll has increased to 112 killed.

The fires have been burning with the highest intensity around the city of Viña del Mar, where a botanical garden founded in 1931 was destroyed by the flames. At least 1,600 people have been left without homes.

Continue reading...

Parisians vote in favour of tripling parking costs for SUVs

Posted on by

The referendum comes as the city aims to reduce emissions by targeting wealthy drivers in large, polluting cars

Parisians have voted to triple parking costs for sports utility vehicles (SUVs), as the city aims to tackle air pollution and climate breakdown by targeting rich drivers in heavy, large and polluting cars.

In a referendum on Sunday, which was closely watched by other capital cities, including London, 54.6% voted in favour of special parking fees for SUVs, according to provisional results. However, the turnout – at about 5.7% of Paris’s registered voters – was lower than green campaigners had hoped for.

Continue reading...

US says strikes on Iran-linked militias just ‘the beginning’ of its response

Posted on by

National security adviser refuses to rule out targeting Iran after 85 sites were attacked in Iraq and Syria

US airstrikes on Iranian-backed militias in the Middle East were just the beginning of a sustained response, the White House national security adviser warned on Sunday, as he refused to rule out strikes on Iranian soil.

Jake Sullivan said the strikes on Friday night against 85 targets in Iraq and Syria, designed as retaliation for the killing of three US soldiers, “were the beginning, not the end of our response, and … there will be more steps, some seen, some perhaps unseen, all in an effort to send a very clear message that when American forces are attacked, when Americans are killed, we will respond and we will respond forcefully”.

Continue reading...

‘They told me we’re all Russians’: fears grow over ‘re-education’ of Ukrainian children

Posted on by

Russia, which boasts of taking in 700,000 children, stands accused of trying to erase their Ukrainian identity

During the 14 months for which Veronika Vlasenko attended school in Russia, she was regularly told by teachers and fellow students that she would never be able to go home to Ukraine. “Every day they said to me that I would be staying here for ever and would never leave Russia,” she said. “They told me that Ukraine doesn’t exist, that it never existed, that we’re all Russians … At times the other kids would beat me for being pro-Ukrainian.”

Veronika was one of nearly 20,000 children documented by Ukrainian authorities as having been taken from Ukraine to Russia over the past two years. The authorities believe the real number is probably 10 times that, while Russian officials have even boasted of moving 700,000 Ukrainian children to Russia.

Continue reading...

Former Barcelona footballer Dani Alves’s rape trial to begin on Monday

Posted on by

Brazilian, 40, has been charged with the rape of a 23-year-old woman in a nightclub

The former Barcelona and Brazil footballer Dani Alves will appear in court on Monday charged with the rape of a 23-year-old woman in a Barcelona nightclub.

Alves, 40, faces damning scientific and video evidence, as well as witness accounts.

Continue reading...

Campaigners criticise ‘absurd’ plan to take apart and rebuild Curie lab in Paris

Posted on by

French government to hear last-ditch appeal this week over new culture minister’s ‘compromise’ for Pavillon des Sources

Campaigners battling to save part of Marie Curie’s Paris laboratory have said the decision to take it apart brick by brick and rebuild it is “totally absurd”.

They warned that once the Pavillon des Sources is dismantled under the “compromise” plan announced by the new culture minister last week, it is unlikely to be restored.

Continue reading...

Overnight Israeli airstrikes kill scores in Gaza as fears grow of push into Rafah

Posted on by

More than 127 reportedly killed in bombings, including in Rafah where more than a million people are sheltering

Israeli airstrikes across Gaza killed scores of people overnight, as fears grow of the military campaign intensifying in the southern city of Rafah, a tiny pocket of the territory where more than a million people are sheltering.

Amid intensifying divisions in Israel’s government over the war, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, was expected to arrive in the region on Sunday, his fifth trip since the militant group attacked Israel on 7 October, killing at least 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostage.

Continue reading...