Category Archives: World News

Russia blames Ukraine for antisemitic riot at airport in Dagestan

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Foreign ministry says Kyiv played ‘direct and key role’ after mob stormed planes in search of Israeli passengers

Russia has blamed Ukraine for the antisemitic riot in the mostly Muslim region of Dagestan on Sunday in which an angry mob stormed the airport in Makhachkala in search of Jewish passengers arriving from Israel.

Maria Zakharova, the Russian foreign ministry spokesperson, said on Monday that the riot was the result of a “provocation” orchestrated from outside Russia, with Ukraine playing a “direct and key role”.

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Hostage soldier rescued in Gaza, says Israel

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Ori Megidish said to have been freed as Hamas issues video of three others still in captivity

Israeli forces have announced the liberation of a hostage in Gaza hours after Hamas released a video of three other hostages who remain in captivity.

Ori Megidish, an Israel Defence Forces soldier, was freed during an escalating offensive in Gaza, the IDF and the internal security agency Shin Bet said in a joint statement on Monday night. It said she had undergone medical checks and was doing well.

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Disabled man drags himself off plane after Air Canada fails to offer wheelchair

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Airline was forced to apologize to Rodney Hodgins who flew to Las Vegas with his wife to celebrate their anniversary in August

Air Canada has been forced to apologize after a man with spastic cerebral palsy was forced to drag himself off a plane when the flagship carrier failed to provide a wheelchair for him.

Rodney Hodgins, 49, a hardware salesman from British Columbia who requires the use of a motorized wheelchair, flew to Las Vegas with his wife, Deanna, to celebrate their anniversary in August.

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Acapulco: nearly 100 dead and missing after Hurricane Otis, officials say

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Governor of Guerrero state says 45 confirmed dead and 47 others missing after ferocious storm hit Mexican city on Wednesday

The number of people dead and missing due to Hurricane Otis, a category 5 storm which hammered the Mexican Pacific resort city of Acapulco last week, has risen to close to 100.

Otis battered Acapulco with winds of 165mph (266km/h) on Wednesday, flooding the city, tearing roofs from homes, hotels and other businesses, submerging vehicles and severing communications as well as road and air connections.

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Dutch F-16 jets to arrive at Romanian training centres in weeks; Moldova blocks Russian news agencies – as it happened

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Dutch PM says F-16 jets for Ukraine to arrive in two weeks; Moldova accuses Russia of information war against country. This blog is closed

In its latest intelligence update, the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has said a Russian state-backed private military company (PMC) is specifically attempting to recruit women into combat roles in Ukraine for the first time.

Posting to X, formerly Twitter, the MoD wrote:

Recent social media adverts have appealed for female recruits to join Borz Battalion, a part of Russian PMC Redut, to work as snipers and uncrewed aerial vehicle operators. Redut is likely directly sponsored by the Russian main directorate of intelligence.

In March 2023, Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu said that 1,100 women were deployed in Ukraine, which would equate to only around 0.3 per cent of its force. As Redut’s advert points out, they currently serve in mostly medical support and food service roles.

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Israeli forces appear to be advancing on Gaza City from two sides

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Witnesses report Salah al-Din Road cut as Israel expands assault, in apparent effort to divide strip in two

Israeli tanks and infantry have advanced on Gaza City from two directions, with tanks reported to be on the main north-south road, in an apparent effort to cut the strip into two.

Reports in the Hebrew media, statements from Hamas and Palestinian witness accounts, described Israeli armour operating close to the Mediterranean coast in the north of Gaza in an area where Hamas said it was engaged in heavy fighting.

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Man jailed for life for attempted murder of US woman stationed at GCHQ

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Joshua Bowles, 29, carried out reconnaissance before stabbing victim in Cheltenham in March

A former UK intelligence worker has been jailed for life for attempting to murder an American woman who worked for the US government’s National Security Agency and was stationed at GCHQ in Gloucestershire.

Joshua Bowles punched and stabbed the woman at a leisure centre 3 miles from the UK intelligence, security and cyber-agency’s Cheltenham base after researching the woman and carrying out surveillance of her.

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Higher interest rates help HSBC to more than double profits

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Bank criticised by MPs for being too slow to reward savers as it announces 15% rise in net interest income and $3bn share buyback

Higher interest rates helped HSBC to more than double its profits and hand over $3bn (£2.5bn) to shareholders, as MPs criticised the largest UK banks for being too slow to reward savers.

The London-headquartered bank said it was launching a share buyback, and paying a dividend worth 10 cents a share, after what its chief executive, Noel Quinn, hailed as “three consecutive quarters of strong financial performance”.

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Weather tracker: UK and France brace for Storm Ciarán

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Torrential rain and 100mph gusts forecast in some areas when low-pressure system makes landfall

Storm Ciarán is expected to arrive in the UK and Ireland, France, and the Iberian peninsula on Wednesday night into Thursday. Gusts of up to 100mph (160km/h) could be possible off the western coast of France before the severe winds filter through the Channel. Brittany and the western French coast could experience wind speeds of more than 80mph, and it is likely to remain windy through the weekend.

Torrential rain is also expected, with a chance of flooding in parts of western France and the north-western Iberian peninsula. Coastal inundation is also likely to be a risk along the northern Spanish and Portuguese coasts, as well as along the French coastline, with sea swell caused by strong winds and the low-pressure displacement of seawater. The rest of France could also experience heavy rain.

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UK ministers to hold Cobra meeting on terrorism threat from Israel-Hamas conflict

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Suella Braverman will meet police and national security officials at No 10 to discuss ‘accelerated’ risk

UK ministers will hold an emergency meeting of its Cobra committee amid concerns that the Israel-Gaza conflict has raised the possibility of a domestic terrorist incident.

The home secretary, Suella Braverman, will meet national security officials and police at No 10 on Monday to assess the security risk after the deadly Hamas attack on Israel more than three weeks ago.

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Why the rusting wreck of a second world war ship is so important to China

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The Sierra Madre, deliberately marooned by the Philippines in 1999, is crumbling but repair is being made impossible by an effective blockade by Beijing

It is perhaps the most unlikely kind of military base. For more than two decades, a second world war-era ship, BRP Sierra Madre, has stood deliberately grounded in the remote, shallow waters of the fiercely contested South China Sea, carrying the Philippine flag and guarding against Chinese expansion.

But its future is increasingly precarious, and the ship has become a growing flashpoint in one of the world’s most disputed waters.

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Bangladesh: key opposition figure jailed after rally turns violent

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The opposition is demanding the resignation of prime minister Sheikh Hasina and the transfer of power to a non-partisan caretaker government

Authorities in Bangladesh have arrested a key opposition figure from the Bangladesh Nationalist Party and sent him to prison after a nationwide strike led to violent clashes with security forces.

Media reports said at least three civilians died in the violence, which included an arson attack in the nation’s capital, Dhaka, on Sunday. Dozens of others were injured during the strike.

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Palestinian PM: we will not run Gaza without solution for West Bank

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Exclusive: Mohammad Shtayyeh calls for a ‘comprehensive, peaceful vision’ and ceasefire in Gaza

The Palestinian Authority will not return to governing Gaza after the Israel-Hamas conflict without a comprehensive agreement that includes the West Bank in a Palestinian state, the authority’s prime minister has said.

Israeli civilian and military officials have said their plan for the end of the Gaza war is to have some form of transitional authority rule the territory, perhaps involving Arab states, leading to the restoration of the Palestinian Authority (PA), which was ousted from Gaza in a 2007 Hamas coup.

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Further air and artillery strikes reported in northern Gaza – as it happened

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This blog is closed.

The UN security council scheduled an emergency meeting on Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza on Monday afternoon at the request of the United Arab Emirates, the Arab representative on the council, according to a report by Associated Press.

Israeli airstrikes have hit areas around Gaza’s largest hospital, destroying roads leading to the facility, which is a major shelter for Palestinians fleeing Israeli bombardment, residents have told Associated Press.

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Kazakhstan mourns after ArcelorMittal mine disaster kills 45

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Fire at Kostenko mine is latest in series of deadly incidents, and has prompted nationalisation of global company’s local affiliate

Kazakhstan held nationwide mourning on Sunday after 45 people died in a fire at an ArcelorMittal mine, the worst accident in the central Asian country’s post-Soviet history.

The tragedy, which struck at the Kostenko coalmine in the Karaganda region on Saturday, came after a series of deadly incidents at ArcelorMittal mines and has prompted the nationalisation of the company’s local affiliate.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Moscow says it has shot down 36 Ukrainian drones – as it happened

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Claims drone strike or debris from downed drone has caused fire in oil refinery near Black Sea in Russia

Once a week, Ukrainian parents bring their children to a community centre in Kyiv for canine therapy.

Beijing Xiangshan Forum, China’s biggest annual show of military diplomacy, started on Sunday, but the name of Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu, initially listed in the forum’s agenda as the first guest speaker at tomorrow’s opening ceremony, was not on the agenda.

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Humza Yousaf says parents-in-law are alive in Gaza but have run out of water

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Scottish first minister expresses relief after communications were cut off during Israeli bombardment

Scotland’s first minister has expressed relief after discovering his parents-in-law in Gaza are alive, although they have run out of clean drinking water.

Humza Yousaf said the welcome news had come through on Sunday morning, hours after describing his worries about whether they were alive or dead following the imposition by Israel of a communication blackout in Gaza on Friday.

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Bologna seals off ‘leaning tower’ over fears it is tilting too far

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Italian city’s mayor says square around 12th-century structure will shut for ‘a few years’ for repairs

The square surrounding Bologna’s medieval “leaning tower” is to be closed off for “a few years” amid concerns that the 12th-century structure is tilting a little too precariously.

The Italian city’s mayor, Matteo Lepore, said the closure of Piazza di Porta Ravegnana was necessary in order to “save” the Garisenda tower. “We’re not intervening because we think it could collapse at any moment,, we’re intervening because we want to make it safe and restore it,” he said.

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Civil order ‘starting to break down’ in Gaza as people raid UN warehouses

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Head of refugee agency says wheat, flour and hygiene supplies taken as Israel continues its bombardment

Order is beginning to collapse in the besieged Gaza Strip after thousands of desperate people raided UN warehouses in search of food, as the international criminal court’s top prosecutor said impeding relief supplies to the population may constitute a crime under the court’s jurisdiction.

Wheat, flour and hygiene supplies were taken from on Saturday from four UN-run centres across the blockaded 25- by 7-mile strip, home to more than 2 million trapped people, Thomas White, Gaza director for the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), said on Sunday.

A UN peacekeeper on the Blue Line between Israel and Lebanon was injured in cross-border fire, the world body said.

Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel Macron “stressed the importance of getting urgent humanitarian support” into Gaza.

Jack Sullivan, Joe Biden’s national security adviser, said the US believed “there should be humanitarian pauses to get hostages out, potentially to get aid in”.

A delegation of families of Israeli hostages being held by Hamas urged President Isaac Herzog to keep their plight at the top of the political agenda.

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Acapulco death toll rises to 43 after Hurricane Otis batters resort city

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Guerrero state governor says officials assessing damage after unprecedented 165mph storm hit Mexico’s Pacific coast

The death toll from a devastating hurricane that hit the Mexican beach resort of Acapulco last week has risen to 43, the governor of Guerrero state has said.

Evelyn Salgado added that electricity had been restored to 58% of Acapulco and that officials had visited 10,000 families there and the nearby city of Coyuca de Benitez for a census to evaluate damages.

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