Category Archives: World News

‘Very difficult’: father of Luis Díaz speaks for first time after release by Colombia guerillas

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Luis Manuel Díaz has described how he spent 12 days trekking through mountains with almost no sleep

The father of Liverpool footballer Luis Díaz has spoken publicly of how he endured almost two weeks of arduous treks and sleepless nights while held captive by armed guerrillas on the Colombian-Venezuelan border.

Luis Manuel Díaz, 58, said: “It was a lot of horseback riding, really hard, a lot of mountains, a lot of rain, too many insects.” A weak Díaz, who was helped to and from a chair by his family, told journalists in his home town of Barrancas in Colombia: “I couldn’t sleep peacefully, it was very difficult, almost 12 days without sleep.”

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Israeli troops in key battle with Hamas gunmen near Gaza City hospital

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Doctors accuse IDF of attacking people trying to flee al-Shifa, the hospital portrayed by Israel as the main command post for Hamas

Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza appeared to be reaching a key moment, with close-quarter battles raging around the most important hospital in the heart of its biggest city.

Residents said Israeli forces had been fighting Hamas gunmen all night and throughout the day in the neighbourhood in Gaza City where the al-Shifa hospital is located, considered a key strategic area.

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Labour seen as more divided by voters after tension over conflict in Gaza

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The latest Opinium poll shows Keir Starmer’s personal rating has slumped but the Tories are also suffering from internal divisions

Labour is perceived by voters as far more divided in the wake of party splits over the conflict in Israel and Gaza, amid concerns that there may be further frontbench resignations on the issue this week.

Keir Starmer has also taken a hit, with the latest Opinium poll for the Observer showing a slump in the proportion of voters who regard him as a strong leader compared with a month ago.

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Gay Games delight Hong Kong amid China’s growing hostility to LGBTQ+ community

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Activists have secured a string of legal victories in Hong Kong but it is a very different story on the mainland

After months of pandemic-related delays, Asia’s first Gay Games was held in Hong Kong last week, with nearly 2,400 athletes competing. At the opening ceremony, Regina Ip, the convenor of Hong Kong’s executive council, said the competition represented the city’s commitment to “equal opportunity and non-discrimination”, and praised Hong Kong’s courts for the “numerous judgments” handed down in favour of the LGBTQ+ community in the past decade.

This was met with bemusement by activists and lawyers, who pointed out that Ip’s government has opposed each of those judgments, losing in nearly every single case. Since 2018, there have been at least seven cases relating to LGBTQ+ rights heard by Hong Kong’s courts, with many reaching the Court of Final Appeal, the city’s highest bench. “Why are they still wasting taxpayers’ money fighting these tooth-and-nail litigations when they’re recycling the same arguments and losing?” said Mark Daly, a human rights lawyer who has worked on a number of the cases.

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London’s pro-Palestine march live: 126 people arrested as police highlight ‘deeply concerning’ rightwing violence – as it happened

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Met assistant commissioner Matt Twist says nine officers were injured while preventing a violent crowd reaching the Cenotaph

Scores of people have gathered in Hyde Park for a “stewards’ meeting” before the march, the PA Media agency reports.

They are all wearing hi-vis jackets, while many have also donned keffiyehs, Palestinian scarves.

Armistice Day is a moment of solemn national reflection in remembrance of those who have given their lives in service of our country. It’s important that people can use our rail network to safely travel, free from intimidation.

That’s why I have granted consent for the British Transport Police to make orders under section 14A of the Public Order Act 1986 prohibiting planned protests at various London stations today, meaning anyone taking part will be subject to arrest.

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Middle East leaders hold emergency summit amid seige on Gaza hospital

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Al-Shifa chief says Israeli troops firing at complex, which has no medical supplies, power or water for thousands trapped inside

Leaders from across the Middle East and surrounding region are meeting in Saudi Arabia for an emergency summit on Gaza, as the territory’s largest hospital remains encircled by Israeli forces, without power, and with strikes “on everything moving inside the complex”, according to staff trapped inside.

“We are totally cut off from the whole world, we are minutes away from imminent death,” Mohammad abu Salmiya, the head of Dar al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City, told Al Jazeera.

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Russia-Ukraine war: Kyiv’s mayor says blasts reported in city – as it happened

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This live blog is now closed, you can read more of our Ukraine war coverage here

That’s all from today’s shorter-than-usual Ukraine live blog.

Here is a summary of the day’s main events so far:

Blasts were reported across Kyiv on Saturday morning, as the city came under Russian attack for the first time since September

A former Nato secretary general has put forward a proposal for Ukraine to join the military alliance but stripped of the territories occupied by Russia

The UK’s Ministry of Defence says Russia is ramping up its attempt to weaponise history

Trains carrying cargo in Russia’s Ryazan region were derailed Saturday morning due to “unauthorised interference”

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Deadliest year on record as Phoenix heat fatalities rise by 50%

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Hottest US city, buffeted by extreme temperatures, sees 579 heat-related in 2023, with large proportion among unhoused people

Heat deaths surged by 50% in Phoenix in 2023 – the deadliest year on record after extreme temperatures pummeled America’s hottest city, official figures show.

At least 579 people lost their lives to heat this year, with senior citizens accounting for one in three deaths, according to the year’s final heat surveillance report by the medical examiner’s office in Maricopa county, where Phoenix is located. Another 56 suspected heat deaths are still under investigation.

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Ex-Nato chief proposes Ukraine joins without Russian-occupied territories

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Former secretary general says partial membership would warn Russia it cannot stop Ukraine joining the alliance

A former Nato secretary general has put forward a proposal for Ukraine to join the military alliance but stripped of the territories occupied by Russia.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen has long worked alongside Andriy Yermak, an adviser to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, particularly ahead of the last Nato summit in Vilnius this year that ended with no invitation for Ukraine to join.

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What would Israel look like under a new leader – and who would benefit?

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Israelis are politically divided, but there’s widespread agreement that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government needs to go

For years, the newspaper Israel Hayom has been known as the “Bibiton”. A Hebrew portmanteau, it means “the paper of Bibi”, the nickname for Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It was founded by the late billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson as the mouthpiece for Netanyahu.

Last week, the head of news at the paper, Uri Dagon, signalled a breaking of the ranks, calling on the prime minister to “lead us to victory and then go”, taking aim at the “nonstop political bickering while the war is raging”. In Israel’s fractured and fractious politics, it signalled the cohering of a rare agreement across party lines: the political era of Netanyahu was staggering to its bitter end.

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Israel-Hamas fake news thrives on poorly regulated online platforms

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Claims on X and Telegram include downplaying 7 October Hamas attack and allegations Palestinians are faking scenes of suffering

Disinformation has flourished across a range of online platforms in the month since Hamas launched its bloody attack on Israel, fuelled by weak content regulation on X, formerly Twitter, and Telegram and at times propelled by state actors.

Widely shared faked news and false claims include efforts to downplay the horror of Hamas’s cross-border attack on 7 October through to distasteful allegations that Palestinians, already under heavy bombardment, are faking scenes of violence.

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Amsterdam welcomes decline of nuisance tourism after ‘stay away’ drive

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Some locals say number of stag party-type visitors is down after campaign targeting young Britons

“Brits on tour!” laughed Devon Bennett, finishing her English breakfast at the all-day brunch restaurant Greenwoods. The 23-year-old from Brighton was in Amsterdam with 20 old school friends, attracted by the city’s reputation for freedom, fun and frolics. “If weed wasn’t legal,” said her friend Chloé Bishop, “people wouldn’t come here just to get high.”

But there is some evidence that high times are ending for partying Britons, whose stag and hen nights have become a byword for tourist nuisance in Amsterdam’s red light district.

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As its counteroffensive stalls, Ukraine signals readiness for a long war

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Amid talk of stalemate, long waits for western weapons and attention diverted to Gaza, experts say the conflict could last into 2025

Ukraine’s counteroffensive has stalled, with progress on the two principal axes on the southern front modest since it began on 4 June. Kyiv’s forces have advanced about 10km south of Velyka Novosilka and 9km south of Orikhiv and there appears no prospect of a breakthrough as the weather turns.

Last week, the reality was acknowledged by Gen Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the commander-in-chief of Kyiv’s military. “Just like in the first world war, we have reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate,” he said in an interview with the Economist, while in a related essay he added that the war, after nearly 21 months of fighting, “is gradually moving to a positional form”.

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Macron calls for end to killing of civilians in Gaza as international pressure on Israel grows

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French president’s comments come as aid agency Doctors Without Borders says situation at main Gaza hospital ‘catastrophic’

French president Emmanuel Macron has called on Israel to stop killing babies, women and elderly people in Gaza as the country comes under mounting international pressure, including from its main ally the US, to do more to protect Palestinian civilians.

Macron’s comments came hours before aid agency Doctors Without Borders said it was “extremely concerned” about the safety of patients and medical staff at al-Shifa hospital – the Gaza Strip’s largest – around which fighting between Israeli forces and Hamas was raging on Saturday.

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French social media influencers feel the heat over new law on paid content

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Authorities step up checks and ‘name and shame’ content creators who break rules in move to regulate industry

When Marie Lopez started recording YouTube videos of makeup and hair tutorials in her bedroom in Lyon aged 16, she “ate, slept and breathed” social media.

By 21, she had an online community of millions and was one of the most watched French women on YouTube, posting about topics from bullying and acne to ecology. Now 28, under the name EnjoyPhoenix she uploads content from her life so many times a day that she is scared to count her working hours, aware that part of success is to “reveal more and more” of your private life.

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UN warns violence against civilians in Sudan ‘verging on pure evil’

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UN humanitarian coordinator for Sudan says war between army and paramilitaries is ‘horrific’

Violence against civilians in Sudan is “verging on pure evil,” a senior UNofficial has warned, as fighting escalates seven months into the war between the army and paramilitaries.

“We keep saying that the situation is horrific and grim. But, frankly, we are running out of words to describe the horror of what is happening in Sudan,” said Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Sudan.

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Canada reels at ‘deliberate’ killing of boy, 11, in gangland hit targeting father

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Police call shooting of unnamed boy and his father, Harpreet Uppal, at Edmonton gas station ‘sick and twisted’

An 11-year-old boy has been deliberately shot and killed alongside his father in what police have called a “sick and twisted” escalation of gang violence in the Canadian city of Edmonton.

The boy, who has not been named, was sitting next to his 41-year-old father, Harpreet Uppal, in their vehicle outside an Edmonton gas station on Thursday when they were attacked, police said on Friday. Another child, a friend of the boy, was also present but physically unharmed.

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House speaker Mike Johnson faces key test as government shutdown is days away with no deal in sight – US politics live

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Kevin McCarthy’s replacement tasked with passing legislation to fund the government but issues that toppled predecessor persist

Meanwhile in South Carolina, Kamala Harris officially filed the Biden campaign’s paperwork to appear on its primary ballot:

Joe Biden’s victory in the state’s primary three years ago revived a presidential campaign that appeared to be flagging. After winning the White House, he successfully pushed to make it the first state to vote in the Democrats’ nominating calendar, arguing the process should better reflect the country’s diversity, though not all Democrats were happy about the decision.

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Israel kills seven more Hezbollah fighters on border with Lebanon

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Iranian foreign minister says wider regional conflict inevitable as death toll among militant group rises to 78

Israel has killed a further seven Hezbollah fighters on its northern border with Lebanon, taking the total death toll of Hezbollah fighters to 78 since the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October.

The rising death toll in Lebanon and the killing of 18 Palestinians by Israeli security forces in the West Bank on Thursday prompted the Iranian foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, to declare that a wider regional escalation of the conflict was inevitable.

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