Category Archives: World News

David Cameron’s backing of Beijing-funded development raises questions over business dealings

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New UK foreign secretary’s promotion of China-backed development in Sri Lanka has increased concern he could be a pawn for Xi Jinping

When Chinese president Xi Jinping cut the ribbon on Sri Lanka’s Port City Colombo construction site in September 2014, it was promoted as a future major hub in China’s global infrastructure project, the belt and road initiative.

With a financial centre, beach-front villas and an international yacht marina, the city is aiming to be a rival to Dubai and Singapore. China has already invested $1.4bn in the development, which is due to be completed by 2041.

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Pedro Sánchez is back … now Spain’s PM must make his daring gamble pay off

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The socialist leader’s pact with separatist activists has returned him to power for now, but it’s a strategy fraught with political uncertainty

At the end of an investiture debate that had been fraught, savage and bizarre, even by recent standards, the defeated leader of Spain’s conservative opposition offered his triumphant socialist rival a handshake. It was not accompanied by his warmest wishes.

“This was a mistake,” said Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the People’s party (PP), as he pressed the flesh with a smiling Pedro Sánchez on Thursday. “And you’re responsible for what you’ve just done.”

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‘It’s basically hell on earth’: Gaza City left totally bereft of healthcare

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The raid on al-Shifa hospital by Israeli forces forced out thousands of patients and medical staff

In the early hours of Saturday morning, over piles of concrete and rubble, crowds of doctors and patients walked miles through the destroyed streets of Gaza City, forced to evacuate on foot from what remained of its hospitals. Medics said they feared leaving critically ill patients behind in a city now largely reduced to rubble and overtaken by Israeli forces, where hospitals had been operating without power, fuel, water or food.

“It’s basically hell on earth,” said William Schomburg, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Gaza, describing what remained of life inside the city.

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Taiwan reports increased Chinese military drills nearby

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Defence ministry detects nine Chinese aircraft crossing Taiwan Strait’s median line after tensions were a focus of Biden-Xi talks at Apec summit

Taiwan has reported renewed Chinese military activity including nine aircraft crossing the sensitive median line of the Taiwan Strait and warships carrying out “combat readiness patrols”.

Democratically governed Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory, has complained for the past four years of regular Chinese military patrols and drills near the island, as Beijing seeks to pressure Taipei over its sovereignty claims.

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Taylor Swift postpones Rio concert after fan dies amid heatwave

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Singer says safety comes first after death of Ana Clara Benevides Machado, 23, in sweltering stadium

Taylor Swift’s concert in Brazil on Saturday night has been postponed after a fan died shortly before the start of her gig in Rio de Janeiro on Friday.

The show’s organisers, Time4Fun (T4F), said in a statement that paramedics had attended to Ana Clara Benevides Machado, 23, at the concert venue and taken her to a hospital, where she died an hour later.

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Israeli airstrikes kill 80 in Palestinian refugee camp

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Fears mount for Gaza refugees as nowhere is deemed safe for civilians in effort to destroy Hamas

Israel-Hamas war – live update

Airstrikes on crowded UN shelters in north Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp killed more than 80 people on Saturday, as Israeli plans to expand operations into south Gaza deepened fears for hundreds of thousands of civilians who have sought refuge there.

Underlining the reminder that there is nowhere safe for Gaza’s civilians, an airstrike outside the southern town of Khan Younis killed at least 26 people in the early hours of Saturday morning.

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‘Just look us in the eye’: Israeli hostages’ families arrive at Benjamin Netanyahu’s Jerusalem office

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Thousands had marched for five days to demand action by the Israeli prime minister to bring home the 240 people captured by Hamas

“I am wounded and bleeding. Mummy, I think I’m going to die,” were some of the last words Romi Gonen, 23, said to her mother, Meirav Leshem Gonen, after Hamas stormed southern Israeli towns and kibbutzim on 7 October.

Leshem Gonen, 54, could hear shooting during the frantic 40-minute phone call but tried to comfort her daughter, who was at the Supernova music festival, saying: “Everything will be OK” and “You’ll feel better. You are not alone, you are with me, my darling.”

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Israel says it will increase military offensive in southern Gaza

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Apartment block bombed, killing 26, in area civilians were urged to flee to for their safety

Israel bombed an apartment block in southern Gaza early on Saturday, killing 26 people, soon after announcing plans to intensify operations in areas where the Israeli military had told civilians to flee for their safety.

In the north, a column of medics, patients and refugees trudged out of al-Shifa hospital, the biggest in Gaza, where Israeli troops spent a fourth day searching for evidence of a Hamas command node it claimed was buried below the wards.

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Threat of volcanic eruption leaves Iceland waiting in uncertainty

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Authorities say it could be months before people evacuated from town of Grindavik can go home even if danger subsides

People in south-west Iceland remain on edge as they wait to see whether a volcano rumbling under the Reykjanes peninsula will erupt.

Civil protection authorities said that even if it does not, it is likely to be months before residents evacuated from the danger zone can safely return home.

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Two first responders killed by Russian rocket attacks in Zaporizhzhia

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Ukrainian police say workers were at scene of attacks on village near frontline when Russia launched another strike

Two first responders have been killed by rocket attacks in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine.

Ukrainian police said Russia fired a series of rockets at the village of Komyshuvakha, close to the frontline in Zaporizhzhia, which Russia annexed last year.

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Rally held in Madrid against Catalan amnesty after Sánchez sworn in as Spanish PM

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About 170,000 people demonstrate in capital over socialist party leader’s deal enabling second term in office

At least 170,000 people gathered in central Madrid for another large protest against the controversial Catalan amnesty law that has allowed Spain’s socialist prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, to secure a second term in office.

Sánchez was sworn in on Friday after winning an investiture vote the previous day that came almost four months after July’s inconclusive snap general election. Although the conservative People’s party (PP) narrowly beat Sánchez’s Spanish Socialist Workers party (PSOE) in the election, it was unable to secure the parliamentary support to form a government even with the backing of the far-right Vox party and other smaller groupings.

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Dutch parties vie for voters with no faith in government after string of scandals

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A benefits fraud affair and claims of institutional racism are among issues that led to crisis of trust before this week’s general election

Sandra Palmen was the whistleblower in a scandal that saw 31,000 Dutch families falsely accused of fraud – often dual nationals, single mothers or working families in less affluent postcodes who were financially and personally ruined by unjustly being made to repay every cent from years of childcare benefits.

But Palmen, a top inhouse lawyer who in 2017 wrote an official memo saying an anti-fraud drive had gone desperately wrong, was the only tax-office employee who was pushed out. Now she is standing for a new political party headed by a campaigning backbencher, Pieter Omtzigt, advocating a social contract to repair a series of government scandals in the Netherlands.

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Dozens of Wales fans arrested in Armenia before Euro 2024 qualifier

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Foreign Office says it is supporting families after 32 Wales football fans arrested in Yerevan

More than 30 Wales football fans have been arrested in Armenia before Saturday’s European Championship qualifier in Yerevan.

The Football Association of Wales (FAW) confirmed that 32 supporters had been arrested in the Armenian capital and that the Foreign Office was involved.

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India tunnel collapse: rescue efforts paused over cave-in fears

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Authorities say cracking sound caused ‘panic’ at site in Uttarakhand where 41 men remain trapped

Indian rescuers have paused efforts to reach 41 men trapped in a collapsed road tunnel after a cracking sound created a “panic situation” over the possibility of a further cave-in.

Excavators have been removing debris from the tunnel in the northern Himalayan state of Uttarakhand since Sunday after a section that the workers had been building collapsed.

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Arab forces will not go to Gaza, says Jordanian minister in rebuke of Israel

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Ayman Safadi says credibility of international law at stake as he clashes with senior US official over terms for humanitarian pause

Jordan’s foreign minister has said Arab troops will not go to Gaza as he delivered a blistering criticism of Israel’s war on Hamas.

Ayman Safadi clashed with Joe Biden’s senior Middle East adviser on Saturday, saying a humanitarian pause should not be conditional on the release of hostages held by Hamas. The US envoy, Brett McGurk, said the onus was on Hamas to release hostages as a pathway to humanitarian aid increasing and a pause in the fighting.

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Israel-Hamas war live: Joe Biden says Gaza and West Bank should be ‘reunited’ under Palestinian Authority; reiterates call for two-state solution

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In Washington Post on Saturday, Biden writes: ‘After this war is over, the voices of Palestinian people … must be at the center of post-crisis governance’

A Tanzanian citizen missing since the 7 October raid by Hamas militants on southern Israel has been confirmed dead while a second remains unaccounted for, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Dar Es Salaam said.

In a statement issued late on Friday, it said the family of farming student Clemence Mtenga had been notified of his death and talks were under way on repatriating his body. Searches continue for the second Tanzanian, Joshua Mollel, it added.

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More than 100 pro-Palestine rallies to take place across UK, say organisers

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Groups behind ceasefire protests attended by hundreds of thousands say local action will replace London march this week

Organisers of the pro-Palestine marches that have drawn hundreds of thousands of people to London’s streets have planned smaller action in villages, towns and cities rather than holding a national march in the capital this Saturday.

More than 100 pro-Palestine events demanding a ceasefire in Gaza are due to take place across the UK.

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Apec summit ends with unity on WTO reform but not Gaza or Ukraine

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US gathering of Pacific Rim leaders most notable for meeting between Joe Biden and Xi Jinping, seen as a sign of easing China-US relations

Pacific Rim leaders have shown divisions over the wars in Ukraine and Gaza after a two-day summit of the Apec forum, while pledging support for reform of the World Trade Organization.

The 21 economies that make up the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum – among them Russia, China, the US and Australia – did not mention either conflict in their final joint communique. Instead an accompanying chair’s statement noted the bloc had “exchanged views on the ongoing crisis in Gaza”.

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Venice Biennale’s new, rightwing director has art world guessing

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Meloni’s party is pleased by the appointment but Pietrangelo Buttafuoco has surprised before – not least by adopting Islam

When Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, the incoming new president of the Venice Biennale, was once asked in an interview whether he was a fascist, the Italian rightwing journalist and public intellectual replied: “I am not a fascist. I am something else.”

After Buttafuoco was this week officially nominated to lead the oldest and largest cultural exhibition in the world, it is not just the artists, actors, architects, film-makers, dancers and musicians whose work will be shown at the coming biennales’ six events who are asking themselves what exactly that “something else” may be.

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Philippines earthquake: authorities report deaths from falling debris

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Shopping mall ceiling collapse among reported damage after earthquake of 6.7 magnitude hits Mindanao region

The death toll from a strong earthquake off the southern Philippines rose to five on Saturday as authorities reported more casualties across two provinces.

The 6.7-magnitude quake that struck the Mindanao region mid-afternoon on Friday caused part of a shopping mall ceiling to collapse, triggered power cuts and sent people fleeing into the streets.

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